Reflection

Jan 6, 2020 

You know those moments when you pause and see yourself? It’s almost like taking a snapshot or looking objectively from the outside. I had a moment like that today.

The sun was dropping low as I drove our John Deere Gator to the outdoor spigot. My three boys were piled in the back with a bale of hay, wearing boots and hats that were speckled with pieces of dried grass and mud.  I was wearing boots and a red buffalo plaid hat myself and pulled the spigot handle up and waited patiently for the water which was always slow to come out. I glanced out across the pasture with amusement. If someone had asked me a couple years prior where I had seen myself headed, this wasn’t it.

Earlier that day I had sat in the doctor’s office and found myself saying, “We got goats… Cleaning out hogpens…” The doctor had laughed, and it made me realize how funny I sounded with my story. Months earlier I had been in her office wrapped up in anxiety and pain barely able to go on. Today, I sat there with welts of swollen poison ivy all down my arm and on my swollen face. She chuckled at my situation and sent me out the door with prednisone and an antibiotic. I thought back over the appointment. I wasn’t the same person I had been months earlier. Several losses in my life and a jam-packed schedule had had me wrapped up so tightly I could barely breathe. Now, I was a much less stressed very reluctant farmer who happened to get a very unfortunate case of poison ivy in the winter. If I had to choose, I would definitely choose the latter even if the triage nurse today had sputtered, “Poison ivy? How on earth did you get poison ivy in the winter?” I sometimes try to rationalize with God and tell him that in his process of growing me to be more like Him, making me goat farm was a bit extreme. I’ve come to realize that God has a gracious sense of humor. And even in my miserably itchy situation, I’m not going to question his methods. I have a peace in my soul that He’s working all things for good, and He has a plan. The next time you take a look at yourself objectively and your snapshot doesn’t line up to what you envisioned, I hope you feel peace and know God’s got a plan for you too.

I turned off the spigot, hauled the bucket of water into the gator, and drove off with the boys to feed and water goats. And I have resolved to never ever touch another vine as long as I live. 

Romans 8:28 And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.