all consuming fire: the waldo canyon fire.

Exactly one week ago, on Saturday, I looked in my rear view mirror and saw a tower of smoke that didn't look like a regular cloud. I said to my mom who was in my car with me, "Look at that cloud, do you think that could be a fire?" She couldn't see it and we dismissed the notion. My sister called ten minutes later and said "Did you see the fire?" There was a fire in the mountains by Waldo Canyon. Little did we know just how much destruction this fire would bring our city.

I immediately got on my Highland College page and asked everyone to be praying that they could contain and get this thing out fast.

The next few days we lived not in Colorado Springs, but in Smokeville, Colorado. The air was completely overtaken with smoke. It was the same feeling you get when you stand in front of a campfire, the smoke blowing in your face, the smell, burning in your eyes...except you couldn't get away from it.

The fire continued to grow and by Tuesday it was 5,500 acres and 0% contained.

3pm. Tuesday. The darkest day.

That was until about 5pm. The winds hit. 65 miles per hour. The fire went from just being on top of the mountain to jumping down into an area they had thought it would not cross, to begin moving down the mountain and into the city.

The fire quickly made its way down into the foothills, into communities, consuming everything in its path.

The previously calm news reporters became instantly unnerved and you could hear the tension in their voices.

The entire city. I cannot begin to explain to you the fear and panic that was in the air. Every single eye in the city was on that mountain, watching the fire come down, not knowing how far it would go or if we were safe.

There was no way to know what it was going to do, or where it was going to go.

I called about ten people from back home and my home sponsors, Sam and Jackie, trying to choke back the tears and fear that was trying to consume me.

I talked with Sam and Jackie, and prayed with them over the phone for my city, the firefighters and officials and the weather to calm down. I am so blessed by their relationship and the encouragement and peace they so often extend to me when my heart is in chaos.

I went down to the park down the street from my house with my sister, and along with about 30 other people with the same idea, watched this fire consume our horizon. It was like nothing I had ever seen before. The flames were massive. The entire skyline was on fire. Going down, quickly down the mountain. Every black plume of smoke that went up was another home that the fire was consuming. I was watching people's lives, work, and dreams being stolen right in front of my eyes. It was surreal.

My view. The orange is all fire.

I was watching my mountains and my city burn.

It was like Nero's Rome.

I could not believe what we were seeing.

Pieces of ash were falling from the sky. 20 miles from the mountains where the fire was burning. Burned up maps, pages of books, a page from a Bible, a piece of fruit that still had the sticker on it. Things that had to have come from people's homes.

A burned map of Rome.

It felt like a scene from one of those horrible, cheesy weather movies we all make fun of.

But it wasn't.

This was real. It was happening.

This was one of the most terrifying moments of my life. Fires can't be predicted or controlled, at least not completely. It is so scary how fast it can turn on you and enter a path of attack and destruction. All it takes is a tiny shift in the winds.

I thought I knew what God meant when He says "I am a consuming fire."

I had no idea. I know now.

Every day I find myself singing this chorus over my city:

"Let it rain. Let it rain. Open the floodgates of Heaven."

My city needs a miracle. The fire is 50% contained. It is predicted, if the weather cooperates, to be contained by July 16th. 32,000 people have been displaced from their homes. 349 homes were destroyed on Tuesday night alone. Two lives taken. Countless robberies since. We need a miracle. We need rain.

Pray for Colorado Springs and the entire state of Colorado, as we fight roughly 15 fires statewide.

This fire destroyed, but it did not end something. It started something new. Beauty will come out of these ashes. Isaiah 61.