It has been an interesting week full of lots of variety. A typical week that many experience every month. As I reviewed what I did and what happened, I realized that quite a few events involved things that God created, most on the 6th day of Creation Week! Animals!!
Early in the week, we stopped at the church to do some cleaning. I started to sweep the sanctuary and Garry was still in the entry. Working and minding our own duties, without thinking my hand went to the back of my neck to brush away something that was annoying. Immediately I began to think about what I had absent mindedly done! For years I have known to avoid all things that are inclined to sting! I am allergic to stings and mentally allergic to stinging things. I tend to run, or scream, or both and my breathing accelerates rapidly. Yes, I was stung by a wasp that was riding around on the back of my neck. I confess to screaming--this time! We were away from our normal emergency supplies, but Garry did manage to find some antihistamine pills for me. Meanwhile my finger was swelling and very painful and I definitely needed to calm down. But once again, God protected me, and I am back to normal, and I am thankful that nothing happened that I could not handle and thankful that God helped me handle it.
The next morning, Garry observed that there were huge deep tracks in our garden, and he commented that someone had been tramping around in our garden and it had not been us! We were wanting to plant in nice soft tilled ground, not track punched ground. We are used to animals making tracks and chickens scratching and making dusting nests, but these tracks were not from chickens or deer or a dog. Asking, Garry learned that a couple of horses had escaped their corral and had fun walking through our newly planted sweet corn and along the future pickles and in many other parts of our garden. While the horses had fun, the chasers and round up people did not have fun! They did end up putting the horses back where they belonged without too much actual damage done. And we were thankful! God has animals that provide us pleasure and help, but in this case not so much help!
Garden has been part of our focus this week as you might have guessed. We are trying to be sensible about what and how much gets planted keeping in mind what we think we are capable of taking care of. Our wants pretty much exceed what we can do. After planting too many tomatoes last year, we will not be doing that again! While we were planting, we enjoyed listening to the birds singing in the trees around us. I became aware of a bird making a fuss--not singing! The grackles get very disturbed this time of year when they have young still in the nests and cats are around and about. So, hearing the squawking of parent birds, I looked up to see which cat was guilty of getting too close this time. It wasn't a cat! I saw a grackle chasing a squirrel nearly as fast as any squirrel can run. And they were then followed and sort of chased by our farm kitty named Nola. I suppose that if we had a farm dog, it would have been involved in the chase too!!? My other question that I can only guess the answer to was what did the squirrel do to cause such a parade? It added a note of "funny" to our afternoon of work. As far as I know everyone survived--this time. I am thankful for each of them and also for the amusement. God has a sense of humor!
Another night we were having a light evening meal when Garry said--Look, Look! He had seen a deer walking past our window--headed to our garden. Deer in our garden have not been good in the past and we would rather they not travel through it as they continue on their mission. They tend to wander a bit and frequently take nibbles! I have discovered that some are things they really like and come back to again and again. But this time our garden was just in its beginning stages, and after a bit, we noticed the same deer walking past our window again, this time headed back away from the garden. Once again, I am thankful that we were able to enjoy one of God's creatures without distress.
We also took time to visit our local neighborhood cemetery to place flowers in honor of family members. Cemeteries are necessary because of sin. Disease, accidents, old worn-out bodies, and war are the results of sin. It is the place where so many of our immediate family are resting until Jesus calls them to wake up and go home with Him. My mother always made sure that flowers were placed for Memorial Day, and I know that she would appreciate someone continuing to do what was important to her. The wind has been a bit strong this week and kept blowing the cemetery gate closed before we could even drive through it safely. And all the flags in place for each veteran were definitely proudly waving for each life well lived in service. I stopped to think about each person in my family--and how they left me a knowledge of God's love and care for me and for the ultimate service Jesus did for me and for you. Yes, we are missing each one of them so much, but God is preparing for us to be reunited with them forever.
All of these happenings did not start out good. We live in a world where so much of what happens is not good. A listen to the news each day is mostly about things that are not good. It is pretty disturbing, distressing, almost hopeless. But in each of these stories, the old proverb of "All's well that ends well" speaks truth. Each story had a good ending--God can make good out bad! But so often we do not see the good. We tend to stay with the bad thing that ruins our day if we let it and fail to find the good and be thankful.
Look for the GOOD each day! It is God's blessing on the day!
