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A Winter Storm: Beautiful and Dangerous
Thursday, January 16, 2025 by Sarah Schwerin

The snow-covered mountains looked like the setting for a Hallmark movie. I peered through the ice-coated tree branches, looking for the big city girl who had returned to her small town. Soon, a horse-drawn sleigh would glide over the glistening snow with the hunky Christmas farmer at the reins. Yet, it wasn’t Christmas, and we weren’t in a romantic movie. No picture-perfect couple. Just me, my road-weary husband, and our twenty-year-old always hungry son.

We’d left our Florida home Friday morning with plans of spending the night at my dad’s house in Kentucky, before dropping our son off at college. Instead, we had to stay in a hotel in Chattanooga, Tennessee, hours away from our destination. Road conditions and a bald tire made it too dangerous to drive once the sun went down and temperatures plummeted.

Saturday morning, we continued our journey, marveling at how different everything looked covered in snow and ice. How could something so beautiful be so dangerous?

As a child growing up in Kentucky, snow meant sledding, hot chocolate, and time off from school. Yet to adults, snow equaled perilous roads, slips and falls, power outages, and loss of income from a closed business.

Beautiful but dangerous.

To many in ancient Israel, the religious leaders of the day were just as perfect and beautiful as the plaid-shirted hero of a Hallmark movie. Dressed in resplendent robes, they seemed to have all the answers and did everything correctly. Yet their thoughts and hearts told a different story.

Jesus said it this way: “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness” (Matthew 23:27, ESV).

I’ve met people who are as beautiful as a winter storm and just as dangerous. Their words hurt. Their actions sting. They spend so much time looking Instagram-worthy that they forget how to be kind. Sadly, I’ve sometimes been the person who had all the right looks, but inside death stayed around, like the gigantic pile of dirty snow in a parking lot. My actions and words have wreaked havoc on those around me. How about you? Are you beautiful and dangerous?

God wants to give us a makeover, but he doesn’t want to touch our outward physical flaws. He wants to remake our thoughts and actions. We can invite God to clean our messy hearts. God can transform us. He makes dead things live again. If you’d like to learn more about what it means to have God transform you, I’d love to talk to you. Please message me or comment below.

If God has already transformed you, how can you keep living a transformed life?

During the winter storm, we had to be alert and vigilant. In the same way, we need to be alert for things around us that may appear beautiful but are really dangerous. Life isn’t a Hallmark movie. Dangers may be inside us or lurking in the forecast. Yet, no matter the danger or storm, God is stronger.

“Stay alert! Watch out for your great enemy, the devil. He prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour. Stand firm against him, and be strong in your faith. Remember that your family of believers all over the world is going through the same kind of suffering you are” (I Peter 5:8-9, NLT).

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