The RNC is in the "hands of God" - Gustav and Hanna

McCain is already doing what presidents do. Today he's in Mississippi with his wife and running mate at the emergency management center in Pearl, Mississippi (which could be the hardest hit area tomorrow in Hurricane Gustav's path). The Republican National Convention just got all but cancelled…

The RNC has suspended all but the most necessary activities to constitute a convention Monday and then will adjourn, John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee announced Sunday. “We must redirect our efforts from the really celebratory event of the nomination of president and vice president of our party to acting as all Americans,” McCain told reporters before the conventions events were suspended. He and Palin received a closed-door briefing by officials with the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency. The convention “will suspend all activities except those that are absolutely necessary,” McCain said. “We hope to resume some normal activities but frankly that is the hands of God.” McCain called on party members to “act as Americans” and “not as Republicans” because “America needs us now.”  

McCain Campaign Manager Rick Davis said that additional activities will be determined on a day-by-day basis. He added that all activities at the convention will be procedural and not political…. Davis said the only critical activities of the convention are its constitution through the gaveling in of the opening session, certification of the Republican National Committee delegates and the nomination of both McCain for president and Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as vice president. The first two can occur on the Monday afternoon session. The nominations had been scheduled for Wednesday. In order to hold the convention, a quorum — or 50 percent plus one of the delegates — needs to be present. Davis said the quorum will be called at 3 p.m. ET Monday and the opening session will last a couple hours.

Davis said he encouraged the speakers to attend and deliver their speeches, but he did not want to speculate on whether McCain would attend. He called speculation the Arizona senator might not attend to accept his nomination as “completely immature” and “outside the scope of what I can tell you with any specificity.”

“If conditions allow, we’d love to have him here, and that would be our preference, but again we’re not making any commitments past 5:30 tomorrow afternoon,” Davis said.  

I know there is obvious humor and irony in the fact that some Christians were asking God to send rain of biblical proportions on the sacred rituals at the Temple of Obama in Denver last week and instead the Democrats enjoyed beautiful weather. Some see it as God's sense of humor that the RNC now gets two back-to-back, massive hurricanes during their big week.

The former DNC chair Don Fowler is laughing about the hurricane saying it "just demonstrates God's on our side." The video clip, secretly recorded by the guy sitting behind him on a plane, is a must see. He apologized earlier this evening saying he was "just poking fun at Jerry Falwell and the nonsensical thing he had said several years ago" referring to Falwell's comments about 9/11 being God's punishment for abortion and homosexuality.

Crazy liberal film maker Michael Moore stepped in it big time on MSNBC’s “Countdown with Keith Olbermann” - the video clip is here. I'll paste the highlights and added print commentary that comes with the clip…

“I was just thinking, this Gustav is proof that there is a God in heaven,” Moore said, laughing. “To have it planned at the same time – that it would actually be on its way to New Orleans for day one of the Republican Convention, up in the Twin Cities – at the top of the Mississippi River.” After that comment, Moore backed off a bit and did say he hoped nobody got hurt and he hoped everybody is taking cover. However, he failed to make note of the $43.625 billion in damage the last hurricane to strike New Orleans caused – Hurricane Katrina in 2005 – and the billions of dollars the storm cost taxpayers.  

I have good friends in ministry in Baton Rouge who were major players during the Katrina disaster. We are already connecting there and planning again to respond with tangible help. We are praying. It's no joke and laughing matter although some arm-chair theologians give me cause to chuckle as they half-seriously speculate God is judging the RNC while he blessed the DNC. The Bible says God sends rain on the just and the unjust. But make no mistake, sometimes, he speaks through stuff like storms. The Bible is full of examples, history is as well.

Gustav means "royal staff" or "staff of God" - which is interesting in light of 1 Samuel 8:6-9 where God was displeased that they turned away from Him and placed their hopes in an earthly king. Gustav formed over the Atlantic on the opening day (8/25) of the Democratic National Convention. As the time frame of this storm from beginning to end perfectly brackets BOTH political party conventions, perhaps, and perhaps not, the raised "staff" is God's reaction to an entire nation's false-placed hope? We are called to "watch and pray."

On Gustav's heels is hurricane "Hanna" which means grace and favor. Hannah was an intercessor who gave birth to Samuel who spoke the Word of God during that same troubled period in the national life of Israel. Those who believe the Bible (and don't scoff at the notion that God uses circumstances, weather, and whatever to speak to us) aren't finding humor in the times in which we live. These are days to turn to Him, days for intercessors to kick into high gear to help birth a "Samuel", a prophet and a judge to help shape the course of the nation.

For those who are likely to misunderstand all this… all I'm saying is that both the DNC and the RNC are in the hands of God.

Maybe Barry Obama got to put on his performance before the facade of pillars and McCain's pre-Presidential moment is to face the storm. Frankly I'd rather see how a candidate fares in a national crisis than watch his fleeting fireworks show in a stadium.