January-March
Where do I even start? It’s November 8, 2018. My alarm rings at 5:30 a.m. I’m so tired, I consider going back to sleep, but tell myself “no.” So I get up, wash my face, and brush my teeth so I can wake up and spend time with God. I study something along the lines of how we are spending our time daily and that time is short. I am glad I woke up and studied. Next, I get ready for work and get to the hospital by 6:47 a.m. where I work as a registered nurse.
I manage to get reports on my patients and start my day when Sarah, the supervisor comes to the unit and tells the staff, “There is a fire but don’t panic.” I continue doing my morning routine and go to get medications for my patients when the charge nurse comes in and says, “There is a fire and we might have to evacuate, but continue working and listen for further orders.” So, I focus on assessing my patients, giving them meds, and charting before we might have to evacuate.
A while later, I am in a patient’s room, giving her meds, when I overhear the news from her TV, “There has been a mass shooting in southern California.” I then look outside her window and can’t see anything clearly due to all the smoke. I warn my patient, “Don’t panic, but we might have to evacuate the hospital. There is a fire, but don’t worry, I’ll take you with me.” She thinks I am kidding, but I change the tone of my voice, and she realizes that I am serious.
I go out to the nurses’ station where I can look outside, and when I do, my mouth, my heart, and all my organs drop. The fire is burning right outside—higher than the hospital building! I tell the charge nurse, “Look outside, we’ve got to go, NOW!” She says that she doesn’t want to look so she could focus on her tasks, but I convince her to look and that’s when the supervisor comes and tells everyone, “Get EVERYONE INTO WHEELCHAIRS AND GET THEM OUT NOW!!!”
So, we all scramble to get the charts, then we let the patients hold their own charts while we put them into wheelchairs. I have never seen directors, students, staff, and coworkers work that fast. I think it took us less than ten minutes to clear the whole unit! In the meantime, while we are inhaling smoke that had already started creeping into the hospital, I see looks of fear, compassion, and panic in many people’s eyes.
We evacuate everyone to the Emergency Room (ER), and check each patient room to make sure that they are empty; then we all run to the ER and get anyone—police, staff—with cars to take the patients to our neighboring hospital.
I then rush back home because there was another fire and plenty of smoke in that direction. On the way there, I see houses burning rapidly right next to me and lots of smoke. I come home, and my family is there, unpacked, waiting for authorities to tell them to get out. I say “MOM!!! Houses are burning around our house! Get everything and let’s GO!!!” I must have had less than five minutes to pack my belongings. I throw them into my suitcase and run out; then I go to get my chickens and my dog. My mom drives the other car with my sister, and my dad drives the third car. My mom is following me down Pentz Road while I stop a moment to watch my town turning to ashes. Suddenly, I realize that my dad isn’t with us! I ask my mom where he is and she says, “He had to go back to Paradise Adventist Academy to save the computer servers he had built,” “WHAT?!?” Then I ask, “Where are our birds??” At that moment, I realize that Frostie and Pickles—our pet birds—and our bearded dragon, Amber, are still back at home.
I break out in tears and tell my mom, “Mom, take the stuff from my car and put it in your car. I have to go back to the hospital and help out. I also have to get the birds.” But she says, “No, you’ll get stuck on the road.”
With tears . . . fear . . . worry . . . thanksgiving, and a constant calling out to God, we head down the mountain, hoping that my dad makes it. I am so torn between my family, coworkers, patients, and my pet birds.
My dad ends up getting stuck as he went back into town. He calls and says, “If I don’t see you again, I love you all.” I start to cry! He says that there are fires on both sides of the road, and on the road itself. Traffic is very heavy and barely moving. He says that it looks like midnight when in fact it is 9–10 a.m. My mother says, “Don’t worry, God will protect him because He is being faithful to God and preaching the three angels’ messages.”
With our prayers and those of our family and friends, my dad was able to come out safely; I gave him the biggest hug ever when I saw him.
As the day progressed the fire kept growing, blocking all three exit routes from Paradise. Over 500 people that we knew, were still stuck and congregating in different locations, while firefighters were pouring water over those buildings in an attempt to save them.
Later, I found out that some of my coworkers were also stuck at the hospital with patients in critical conditions. The hospital had caught on fire, and so they had to move to the helipad and wait there for hours, hoping that help would come.
As I’m reading so many stories of what my coworkers and friends went through, it breaks my heart. It broke my heart when I heard a news reporter saying, “Paradise has been wiped from the map,” and “this fire is the fastest growing fire in history, growing at 80 football fields per minute.”
It breaks my heart that people were stuck in traffic in thick smoke while attempting to escape the fire, but the fire caught up to them. It breaks my heart that some people burned in their cars, while others chose to stay in their homes because they were elderly or too tired to escape. It also breaks my heart when I think of all those pets that were left behind to be burned.
We may have nothing left, but do you know what I’m thankful for? I am thankful for so many things:
1. God is keeping me alive every day. He wakes me up, and helps me to refocus my life and learn so many spiritual lessons in the process.
2. I am thankful that my family is with me.
3. I thank God my coworkers are alive.
4. I am grateful we have a place to stay. Thanks to those who offered and contributed to our needs.
5. I am thankful that our three cars survived the fire.
6. I praise God for prayers from loved ones.
7. I am thankful for prayers that our home didn’t burn, and that it’s still standing.
8. Thank you, God, for angels, for firefighters, for police, for hospital staff, and all others who helped.
Life is simple now. All I can say is praise the Lord. You may ask, “How can I help?” I say, pray and get ready! Get ready! Get ready!!! Let’s get ready, wake up, focus on the important things. You could be next.
Our neighbor called a few days after the fire and told my dad that a policeman had gone to our neighborhood and there were no houses standing. We had already thought that would be the case unless God had saved it. The fire was in our neighborhood already when we left.
Despite the news that our home was burned, we still kept praying and decided not to believe the report until we actually saw the house for ourselves. People kept posting photos of their burnt homes on Facebook, and I asked each of them to please check on our house and to feed our birds. People responded with, “I’m sorry, we can’t.”
Finally, my atheist coworker replied, “My husband is fighting the fire, I’m not sure where he is but I’ll see if he can check your house.” The next day she told me, “My husband checked on your house, and it is the only one standing in the neighborhood. It’s crazy! How is that possible?”
“I don’t know!” I told her, “but I’ve been praying so much!” I still wasn’t completely positive that they were in our neighborhood, so I asked if they could feed the birds. She answered, “They went to the garage and fed two birds and gave them water.”
As soon as those words registered in my brain, my mouth just dropped, my hand covered my mouth and I started shivering and crying like a little baby. I have never cried like that in my life. I went into the bedroom where we were staying, knelt beside the bed and just sobbed and cried out to God, “Oh God! You are too good to me! You are Almighty! You truly care for even the little sparrows! I don’t deserve it! I don’t deserve it! I don’t deserve it, but I thank you so much! I choose to serve you fully. Oh God, You are faithful to us, but why are we so unfaithful to You? Please help me not to be an Israelite who always makes promises and breaks them.”
From that experience I learned we should praise God and count our blessings even through trials and when we think we have lost everything in this world. As I was evacuating from the flaming town of Paradise, I told God, “God, this is Your time to SHINE. I know You can do miracles, but let Your will be done.”
Another day passed and we tried to check on our house and the birds, but a policeman said that it was not possible. The next day, a friend asked for my address. She would try to see if her contact—a policeman—could go check on the birds. My dad and sister also decided to go. When the policeman saw my dad, he got out of his car, and gave him the biggest hug ever, even though they didn’t know each other. Then, he looked my dad in the eye and asked, “Do you believe in God? Because nothing, nothing is standing in your neighborhood except your house. The fire burned everything right to your fence and everything inside was not touched!”
Wow, that is another lesson I learned. Instead of letting us enter our home to get our birds, God wanted the policeman to see His works! Instead of someone else going to see if the house was okay, God used my atheist coworker to see the power of God! I am truly in awe of our God, and I realize that when things don’t go our way, we just have to believe that He has a bigger and better plan in mind.
There are many calamities happening around the world, causing mass destruction. We see prophecy fulfilling right before our eyes. What are we doing? Will we wait until our town/city/state/nation is affected? Shouldn’t we be proving faithful to God and keeping His commandments before it’s too late? Our every word and action is being registered in the books of heaven. Are we pleading with God to forgive us our sins and those of our loved ones?
This major fire is a wake-up call for all of us! Study the word of God, plead with God. Repent! Jesus is getting ready to finish His work in the Most Holy Place and to take His people home. I am so blessed by my father, who has given himself to God, and is working to get the people ready for the time of the end. What is holding you back? I plead with ALL of you—the time is at hand! Get ready, get ready, get ready!!!
“For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world; looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ; who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works” (Titus 2:11–14). [Emphasis added.]