A Bunch of Weeds

This morning I had a nice long quiet time with the Lord. And I literally mean QUIET time . I barely prayed a word.  I just said “Ok God, speak for your servant is listening”. Of course  at first it was mainly just clutter in my head. Random thoughts. Emails I need to return. But slowly the noise in my head quiets down. I go outside and sit on the porch to drink my coffee. I  get up and wander over to the garden to straighten up a few things. I sit back down and let my eyes  look over the Ponderosa ( what my dad calls their property.)

 The Ponderosa-the place I grew up. The place where I would roam fields for hours, letting my imagination entertain me.  For example, one afternoon, I turned the barn into Laura Ingall’s house and pretended I was on Little House on the Prairie.  Or I would sometimes walk through the wildflowers (aka weeds) and pretend I was Anne  of Green Gables. I smiled at the memories. Thank you Lord that I grew up here. Those were the first words I had really spoken to Him in 10 minutes.

The childhood memories prompt me to take a walk in one of the fields. Oh the weeds…the allergies..the dirt. But no, I go inside, take an allergy pill, and head back outside. To be honest, it’s a bit of a ragamuffin field. It mainly consists of weeds and gravel. Anne of Green Gables would have NEVER chosen that field to walk in to write her deep poetic thoughts.

As I walked, I remembered roaming those fields as a little girl. Full of imagination. Full of wonder and hope for a good future.  I begin to cry. I cried and cried. I didn’t say anything. I just let the Lord listen to my tears. I knew that He knew- and I guess that’s all I needed to know.  I start picking the flowers that were living out among those weeds. I didn’t have a plan initially but before I knew it, I had made a bouquet.  I found a vase and set the arrangement  on the table. Something beautiful actually came out of that tick infested dirt. I cried some more. The Lord doesn’t waste our pain . He makes beauty out of ashes. And He makes flowers out of ragamuffin fields.  My quiet time this morning? I  basically cried over a bunch of weeds. And somehow it was beautifully redeeming.