“Flight Into Egypt”, Michael D. O’Brien
Joseph, Mary, and the Christ Child camp in the desert at night as they flee to Egypt.
The stark surroundings accentuate their plight,
the danger they are in, the darkness of the world.
As the mother nurses her child, the father stands watch and plays gently on a flute,
the music soothing the Child to sleep.
Their entire life is founded on mutual trust, love, sacrifice,
and abandonment to divine providence. —Artist’s notes
WE can now see it coming into view: the edge of the Great Storm. Over the past seven years, the image of a hurricane is what the Lord has used to teach me about what is coming upon the world. The first half of the Storm are the “labor pains” that Jesus spoke of in Matthew and what St. John describes in more detail in Revelation 6:3-17:
You will hear of wars and reports of wars; see that you are not alarmed, for these things must happen, but it will not yet be the end. Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; there will be famines and earthquakes from place to place. All these are the beginning of the labor pains… (Matt 24:6-8)