Driving up Highway 17 with my mom, I was thinking about how my wart was finally gone off my toe. As a 16 year old this little wart was some of the biggest of my concerns, consuming my thoughts. I was not even thinking about the World Series pre game chatter we were listening to at the time on the radio. My thoughts and concerns focused on my look, my finally normal toe. In a brief moment my mundane, innocent thoughts turned. The road became a sea of waves. The radio fell silent. Trees lined the streets and bowed down to us. An overwhelming eerie quiet and calm filled the air. What had happened?
I quickly realized an earthquake had hit, and began to giggle at all the people pulled over checking their tires for a flat. My mom even commented that she thought we had a flat. Realizing that not every single person got a flat, I urged my mom to continue on, but we were stopped by huge fissures in the highway. We took a back road, to only be stopped again by fallen trees and rushing waters from broken water mains.
As we hiked the few miles home up hill, I looked into the homes, and was amazed at how messy all our neighbors kept them. Not until I walked into my own home did I realize the intense destruction of the earthquake of which its epicenter was two miles away.
Were we prepared that day? In some ways, we have been counseled by leaders and Prophets to store up food, have candles and water to be prepared for an emergency. We had that, well most of that. We didn’t have stored water but some juices and sodas.
I am not sure what I thought an emergency would consist of but nothing from words or lessons could have prepared us for a week with no electricity and six months with no running water, never mind all the rebuilding and repairing that was to take place.
With out the electricity, we turned to our frozen foods, not our can foods. The freezer didn’t stay cold for long, and all that meat and frozen vegetables had to be consumed. I don’t think I ever consumed so much meat in my life. The great part was we sat around the BBQ grill, with flashlights and roasted meat, and shared stories with friends and neighbors. We even delivered cooked steaks to other neighbors, and shared our food with them.
In my few years of life, I had sat through Sunday School lessons and Sacrament meeting talks, as the words of being prepared for an emergency flew over my head. I was a youth. I had no cares. I had no worries. My parents would take care of it all, and they did.
And not only did they, but neighbors and ward members all helped out. We cleaned each other’s houses. We gave food. Wards from across the country “adopted” us and sent us new dishes, meals, other lost items and cash.
In the end of it all I learned a great lesson. Maybe I wasn’t prepared that day for an emergency, I was too preoccupied with my little wart growing on my foot to care about heeding “adult” council. However, there isn’t a day that goes by that doesn’t bring me back to that moment in my life, when we needed to be prepared.
We needed to be prepared to receive help from others.
We needed to be prepared to help others.
We needed several everyday items on hand to survive. Roads weren’t drivable to go down to the store. The local stores received a lot of damage as well, to where their things weren’t sellable.
We needed to be prepared to watch others selflessly serve. Our own Branch President at the time, lost his home, it was leveled. He went around and checked branch members, he helped them out. The local beer company stopped producing beer for a week and just canned water, which they delivered in cases to all the homes in the area.
Emergency preparedness is more than having your shelves lined with canned food, flashlights and blankets. It’s about preparing your hearts for the type of service you will give to others and also the service you will receive.
And like me, just driving along on the freeway worrying more about my little toe, than others, we need to stop on our journey of life and think about those around us; how we can be prepared to serve them as well as take care of ourselves.
President Brigham Young said “Instead of searching after what the Lord is going to do for us, let us inquire what we can do for ourselves.” As we go about praying for the Lord to help us be prepared for our life emergencies, we need to go about and do all that we can to be prepared and pray that He can help us get to the point where we can not only be prepared for ourselves, but prepared to reach out to those around us.
Stop worrying about your little warts, and begin to worry about the bigger picture.
