He is jealous for me,
Loves like a hurricane, I am a tree,
Bending beneath the weight of his wind and mercy.
When all of a sudden,
I am unaware of these afflictions eclipsed by glory,
And I realize just how beautiful You are,
And how great Your affections are for me.

And oh, how He loves us so,
Oh how He loves us,
How He loves us all

The first time I heard the David Crowder Band sing “How He Loves,” I was driving home down the narrow stretch of road alongside the beach. At sealevel, where Hurricane Ike had rolled ashore about a year and a half prior, I couldn’t help but be struck by the lyrics.

I mean, struck to the point of almost being unable to drive because of the tears in my eyes. I mean, struck by the understanding of the past year and a half of my life. I mean, struck with the knowledge of the lengths God will go to in order to accomplish His plan in each of our lives.

I thought I was moved because I have a soft spot for DCB. I’ve been listening to them since I was a Baylor Bear, before they were THE DAVID CROWDER BAND (except they don’t use the “the”, but it sounds awkward without it here) and instead just the cool guys who led worship. I thought the college nostalgia combined with that loaded word “hurricane” struck me.

But then I thought about it as DCB repeated the initial verse.

He loves like a hurricane. We are a tree.

Hours before Hurricane Ike hit Galveston in September 2008, it took up the ENTIRE GULF OF MEXICO. All of it. Not a single droplet of water in that ocean was not under the cover of Ike’s clouds.

The winds roar and swirl. The waves rise and consume. The fury rocks and shakes. In Bolivar, the island to the east of Galveston which bore the brunt of Ike’s transformative power, concrete house slabs were peeled up off the ground like a sticker off a child’s hand. Today, when you drive in Bolivar, you would have no idea that entire subdivisions once existed. There’s nothing of the old remaining.

And what about those trees, bending beneath the weight of the wind? After they bend and make it through the storm, they are often not in the same place they were before. They’re stripped of the leaves and fronds. They’re not the same. Many of Galveston’s historic oaks, planted after the Great Storm of 1900, went in to shock. The ones which did survive required care and fresh water. Hundreds of them didn’t survive. Many of those were made into tree sculptures, bringing a new life and purpose to their once-solid trunks.

God loves like a hurricane. He is all consuming. He loves with a passion, a fury. He loves with an organic purpose, a irrespective of all the careful planning we do with our own lives.

And we are the tree. We can’t be unaffected by His presence. We don’t fully understand His changes overnight. The old is stripped away. And sometimes, He brings something entirely new in the place of what was originally there.

It’s not always wind and waves that make up a hurricane. We all will endure life’s storms. And God brings them into our lives not because of insensitivity, but because He works all things to good for those who love the Lord and are called according to His purposes. I quote that verse often because it’s true.

Hurricanes have a purpose. Our lives have a plan. God shows love in them both.