Hello and Welcome back to Echoes of Grace.
I’m so glad you stopped by. I have missed you and I’m looking forward to re-connecting each Thursday.
This week, I want to share with you the words I penned in my journal early last month about still bearing spiritual fruit. I hope they are as inviting to you as they were to me.
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I sat in my zero-gravity chair on the top of the hill, the shade of the evergreens and the warm breeze protecting me from the summer sun. Our cabin behind me; Lexie (our dog) lying at my back enjoying her morning nap; my view the quiet woods that surround our cabin, God’s creation.
My journal lay open on my lap, and my pen ready and available on top of the empty page. The quiet was almost deafening. Ahhhhh, rest, sabbath.
It was a Sunday morning, but really the day of the week was inconsequential. There was nothing else I was supposed to be doing. Sitting, being, enjoying the presence of God.
“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.”
Exodus 20:8
This indeed was a holy time.
Even the questions I’d been pondering over the summer were absent that morning.
God was indeed present. Although it wasn’t green pastures and still waters, he was restoring my soul. He was with me, shepherding me, comforting me, whispering to me, anointing me. His goodness and mercy were real.
A picture of God’s promise that morning: the mature pine trees anchored in the soil beneath them still bearing fruit in their old age. I rested with that truth.
“The righteous flourish … planted in the house of the LORD;
They still bear fruit in old age; they are ever full of sap and green,
to declare that the LORD is upright; he is my rock
and there is no unrighteousness in him.”
Psalm 92:12-15 (italics mine)
Two Importants:
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Hmmm…. bearing fruit at an old age. I have the honor of working at an Assisted Living as a (relatively) younger person. I love that I get to literally sit at the feet of an elderly person and just soak up their stories. Just the other night one of my favorite residents (98) was talking about who he was going to pray for before he went to bed. I have been prayed for by him. What an amazing legacy to leave!! We had a resident who was a strong prayer warrior. Staff that were not even Christians would go to her. When she passed away I could literally physically feel the loss of her prayers.
I have been really struggling lately with not being a mom. I want with all my heart to be a mom. Satan has been in my head telling me I am to broken, to dirty, I am damaged goods. I talked to my pastor and he encouraged me not to dismiss that role in my life just yet. My prayer over the weekend became “God, I want to be so full of YOU that nothing else matters. I don’t need a baby. I just need YOU. Still hard to surrender that though.
In the meantime God has given me my residents to love on. They often ask me why God still has them here. I try to tell them it’s because I still need them. What an amazing gift to sit under the fruit tree of these residents. Never too old to make fruit. What a beautiful thing.
Wow, Becky, a powerful story. Thank you so much for sharing it.
Prayer – what an amazing legacy to leave. YES!!
That is truly a bold prayer you prayed for yourself last weekend. I wonder how God is going to answer.
You my friend have a good heart, and good desires. And yes, we do need each other. I’m praying for you.