Spring was here and the gardening bug was in the air. The previous year’s garden was, well, unsuccessful. Tomatoes experienced a hard frost days before ripening. The only seed that sprouted, Carl the Carrot (when there is only one you tend to take it personally), vanished mysteriously during the night when it was but a tender 2 inches tall…as so it went.
Undaunted, but often teased by my good friend who can coax a rock to sprout, I decided to try again. The problem, during the winter (which felt about 20 months long) the chickens managed to scratch away all the soil in the raised garden beds. Not an insurmountable problem. Just get some more dirt, right. Well, the dirt around the house was rocky and terrible for growing. Money being tight, I could not justify spending the money it would cost to fill the beds (especially since past experience predicted low production). So, I went around for about two weeks whining about my lack of dirt…mostly in my head but a few friends also had to listen to my dirt dilemma. I really did not even pray about it because who prays about dirt? At this point I probably should have remembered all those bible verses about how God knows all our thoughts. He was listening.
One June morning almost past the point of planting anything and expecting a harvest, my husband headed to our pasture to clean a cattle guard. We had had to chase a rogue band of cattle out of our fields several times over the past week because the cattle guard had filled in and the cows just walked right across the thing. Using a pickax and shovel my husband valiantly attempted to clean the guard. While he was working a neighbor drove past and commented to my husband that he sure was going at it the hard way. They arranged to meet later and the neighbor would bring his tractor to help with the job. Needless to say the giant tonka-toy idea definitely appealed to my overworked husband.
That afternoon, they spent a couple of hours cleaning the cattle guard. When they were close to finished my husband came charging up to house asking if I needed any dirt. They had a big pile and the neighbor was willing to bring up a load with his tractor. At this point I just to had smile to myself because if I had broken out in the laughter I felt…well my already questionable sanity would have appeared even more questionable. I had to laugh at the way God not so subtly reminded me that He knows all of my needs, want, desires, and thoughts and will provide according to His will, even if it is a lowly pile of dirt. Now, whenever I dig in my garden beds or hopefully manage to harvest something, I have a constant reminder of His provision.
