Incredible

I planted potatoes yesterday: Fifty pounds of Kennebec potatoes, carefully sliced to maximize the 'eyes' planted, placed about fifteen inches apart, in fifteen rows in the garden at the farm. The soil worked, well . . . 'like a garden', light and fluffy, easy to rototill, easy to use the potato plow in. It was about four hours of the nicest time I have spent on the farm this Spring, with 80 degree... weather, an occasional cloud, and the sound of frogs absolutely filling the air down by the pond, not so very far away. Incredible.

What is incredible, too, is that I felt guilty about taking four hours away from work. I am the one who preaches constantly about the need for 'Sabbath' yet, if it's good enough for God to take it, if it's good enough for God to include it in the Ten Commandments, if it's good enough for Jesus to observe it, then why do I view taking Sabbath as a guilty pleasure? Is my DNA screwed up? Or have I suddenly found myself worshipping at the wrong altar in the midst of the Lenten journey, sacrificing my soul on the altar of 'way too busy' so that I might achieve the nirvana of 'successful at getting everything done'? Hmmmmm.

While planting the potatoes, I stopped and picked up some soil in my hand and just smelled it. Again, incredible.Some people wax eloquent concerning smelling the roses, I defy you to find a more pure and wonderful fragrance than freshly opened soil in the Springtime. A thousand images of growing up on the farm flooded my memory as I inhaled the intoxicating aroma of that garden soil, but in that moment none stronger than savoring a Sunday afternoon in the Spring just relaxing and enjoying the day, relishing the scent of God at work in new life all around us. Sabbath. Incredible.

I pray for you 'Incredible' today. I pray for you 'Sabbath'. For, and I am speaking to myself here, in the moment we are too busy or feel too guilty to take time to take in the wonders of God, to observe Sabbath, we are missing the very reason we have been created . . . and that in itself is sin. Savor the 'Incredible' today.

Return

My brother, Larry, and I dug up the potatoes the other day. We had managed to plant fifty pounds of Kanabecs between rains late last Spring and now were harvesting the fruits of our labors. It wasn't a huge crop, maybe five bushels or so, but the real reward for me was our labor together.

Larry and I used the garden plow that both our father and grandfather had used in planting the garden. With that old plow, we plowed the rows to plant the potatoes and, at the end of the season, we opened the potato-laden ground to reveal the harvest. As we each took turns pushing the plow from one end of the rows to the other, the sweat and effort gave way to stories of days gone by. Picking up and brushing off the potatoes to be taken to the 'bin' where they will be kept until eaten was the picking up and brushing off of family traditions, both of feeding the family when 'bought food' was not the common thing on the table and of laboring side by side with someone you love.

In this day and age when we are likely to return items to a store, return videos when watched, return newspapers for recycling, return from a trip, or return calls to a client, the once a season moment of digging potatoes together is a gift that will never be able to be returned. For, just as we remembered all those days of our ancestors working the ground in quite similar ways, what transpired on that early Autumn day was a blessing which worked its wonder far beyond the earth which provided our bounty. Not to be returned are the hearts which were touched in love through shared labors, a gift of grace from a very loving God.

The human endeavor may never find its way back to God's original Eden, but every so often, God's Eden appears in sacred places and memory serves to guard us against casually returning that which makes life new again, generation after generation. May my greatest return to God be with such fullness of love in my life.

Your servant in Christ,

Pastor Don