Troubles of Rocky Rubble

As you may know now if you've been with me for awhile, I love gardening. But I have to be honest with you, this particular year has been a year fraught with obstacles. We moved back to Pennsylvania and of course I wanted to put in a garden. So, I had a very good friend bring his Rototiller to my house and proceed to turn over a plot of land that had never been turned over before. It was a relatively small plot but nonetheless it took him several hours to turn it over. As it turns out, the ground is severely rocky. The soil looks exquisite and rich and perfect for garden soil but “ugh“the rocks are beyond belief. Between the rain making the ground constantly soggy and the rocks making it feel like I was digging into concrete, well it’s been a tough year already. It seems that the elements are against me. The relentless rain and now the rocks. Never have I wanted to give up and walk away more but I look at the trays of vegetables that I have purchased and have been given and I just can’t do it! I know it will be rewarding but the obstacles are almost too much to bear.

As is the case in every scenario of my life there’s a lesson or a story to be told. As I hoed the soil this morning and the rock completely bent the tine of my hoe in half I couldn’t help but hear a voice saying “keep going, it will be worth it in the end I promise you”! Well, whether that was God revealing his extreme great sense of humor or whether it was my internal “never say die” voice, it really doesn’t matter. The lesson here is loud and strong. We will have obstacles in our path in this life. We will have roads of rock and rubble and trouble that try to bend us like the tines on my hoe or break us. In this life we will have trouble, guaranteed! But my word of the year and actually word of my life if I were to be honest,  is “perservere”. It says in Romans 5 ““And not only this, but [with joy] let us exult in our sufferings and rejoice in our hardships, knowing that hardship (distress, pressure, trouble) produces patient endurance; and endurance, proven character (spiritual maturity); and proven character, hope and confident assurance”. 

So, when you’re in the middle of your “rocky rubble” or troubles, just hang in there! Keep pressing in through the rocks and obstacles and stay focused on the end goal. It WILL produce something in you that is good and wonderful. You will become stronger and learn to handle those troubles with a new determined maturity the next time you face them. Your character will be built up and “sured up” and reinforced for the next bump in your road. My tine (my spirit) my be bent but my previous trip down rocky roads has caused my character to persevere on! 

So, rejoice and be glad if you will and actually give thanks for those “troubles of rocky rubble”! Now, I’m off to hammer out the tine of my hoe and pick up the rocks. This story will be continued and my garden will thrive, I’m sure if it! Stay tuned. . . . 

SINGLEHEART

I've had many people ask me about my user/screen name that I have used for over 20 years now. ”Where did it come from?” ”What does it mean?” And the best one, ”are you single and looking for love?” I truly laugh at that last question because my user name seems to spur on all kinds of spam mail and emails from dating sites.  Truthfully though, I have been happily married for almost 47 years now and I may have been ” looking for love” at one time but I've certainly found it over 50 years ago now. When I could be referring to my husband here, although he's the love of my life, I'm referring to my truest love and that is my Jesus. The truest kind of love can only be found in Him. Now my husband loves me in all the ways a husband can love but my husband can't give me everything that my truest love can and did. You see, I deal with battling dark days and depression and although my husband can love me by praying with me and taking care of me in every way he can, there are still dark days and only one person can rescue me from that darkness. When I seek peace in the midst of my storm, I cry out to Him and he brings peace and dispels the darkness. Oh there have been times when I questioned His presence and questioned whether he saw me in my depression. But His love never fails and His care for me is evident when I feel His peace flow over my spirit in a way that I can't understand. It soothes just when I can't handle another blow. His love and peace embrace me when my strength is gone. What He gives holds me up when I cant stand. There was an old hymn that we used to sing in church when I was young. It was called ”Wonderful Peace”. The lyrics said, ”Peace, peace wonderful peace, coming down from the Father above, sweep over my spirit and help me I pray, with fathomless billows of love”. What a perfect and exact description of what He does for me. Is it any wonder He is my truest love. So, back to the ”singleheart” thing. Many years ago I remember praying and asking the Lord for a heart after him and what would that look like fully? He took me to the bible to Jeremiah 32:39 where it says, ”I will give them one heart and one way, that they may fear me forever, for their own good and the good of their children after them.” Jeremiah spoke ’exactly’ what a heart after God would look like here! I will give them ONE HEART and One Way. That was my desire. I didn't want to be a double minded, fickle follower of Christ but my desire was to be in one accord with Him. That's what happens when you find your truest love I believe. You begin to think alike, act alike and in every way your hearts are so bound together that the two hearts look like ”One Heart”! Something clicked in me so many years ago. I was even privileged for a while to direct our youth drama team and you've probably guessed, we were called ’ONE HEART”. It is the word that I've chosen to chase after a true love relationship ;with ’singleness of heart’. So ”Singleheart” has been the name I have used. It's deep and rich in meaning for me and reminds me, every time I see it or type it in, of the way I choose to love Him. So, on my deepest and darkest days when my heart beat slows down and I feel sadness and dejection slipping over me like a heavy blanket, I know I can speak the name of my truest love and he will do exactly what that old hymn says. ”Sweep over my spirit and help me I pray with fathomless billows of love”. Fathomless means ’unable to be measured or understood’. I will never understand how He does it but I'll never question it because when I call Him, He always does it because we have ’ singleness of heart’ and an immeasurable love.