The incredibly inspiring “Hand of God” Facebook picture that went viral and was seen by over an estimated 50 million viewers, and was reported on an ABC Action News during an interview with artist, Alyse Nicole Merritt, is Now Available in Print. A portion of the profits will go toward hurricane relief efforts, especially in Puerto Rico and the Caribbean islands.
Artist Alyse Nicole has been painting and drawing inspirational artwork since she was a child. Almost prophetically, when she was a young girl and her father worked on the 97th floor at the World Trade Center, Alyse drew and painted pictures of the Twin Towers in danger, even the towers missing from their location, and in their absence, souls being received by God into heaven. These were painted many years prior to 9/11.
Alyse’s 2016 image of the “Hand of God” was drawn in the midst of Hurricane Matthew, before it was halfway up the coast of Florida, where her dear family and close friends live. Through the watches of the night, Alyse and her children prayed the Hand of God protect her family, that God would not allow a direct hit to Florida and the hurricane would stay offshore. At the time, Governor Rick Scott and expert weathermen all sternly warned a direct hit to Florida was inescapable, would be catastrophic – some networks even exclaiming, “You (and your children) Will Die!”
Though the reality is many parts of Florida were severely damaged and flooded, for the entire 18 hour duration of Hurricane Matthew’s journey, the monster Cat 4 storm did not make landfall in Florida, yet stayed steadily 20-40 miles away from its shores. Even Governor Scott, in his shock and amazement, implied it was miraculous that Florida dodged such a major death bullet and explained countless lives were spared and millions in damage were saved. By the time Hurricane Matthew actually made landfall in the U.S., it was substantially weakened to a Cat 1/Tropical storm.
