These roses growing haphazardly against a rusty cattle panel caught my eye.
Here on Plum Prairie Ranch, my focus is on building a home. That involves caring for family, the community and ourselves. To quote the old saw, “you can’t take care of everyone else if you don’t take care of yourself.” As a person, I bring together mind, body and spirit. If I don’t care for each of those aspects of myself, I’m not going to be very effective in life and relationships.
Seeing the lavish beauty of spring all around me, I want to remember to thank God. He makes all things new. Those who follow Him can experience continual rebirth, an eternal spring of sorts.
Some people doubt the existence of a loving God because of all the terrible things that happen in the world. After following God for more than 30 years, I don’t understand how those without God survive terrible things.
I’m going to tell you here how I came to follow Christ because that is the foundation of how I address the spiritual aspect of life. You may or may not be a Christian. If this totally offends you, just skip on over to my latest DIY project or GF recipe. You are welcome at Plum Prairie Ranch wherever you are in life and faith.
If you know Jesus or if you’re looking for answers to the purpose of life, read on.
My story of how I came to faith in Christ starts with a crisis situation when I was in high school. I don’t want to go into details here because I don’t want anyone involved in the crisis to feel hurt by anything they read here. It also allows you to think of your own tough time and how that impacted your heart and your view of the world.
Before the crisis, life mostly made sense. The world was good and, if I worked hard, I’d have a great life. After the crisis, I realized that there are no guarantees. The world has both good and bad in it, and there is no way to totally protect yourself from bad stuff coming into your life and walloping you.
In the early days of coping with the ongoing struggle, I tried to do everything right, as much as I could, to make sure I did my part to help in the crisis. I got straight A’s, I set the school record in the half mile and I stopped hanging around with a friend who’d introduced me to sneaking out of the house and getting drunk.
All those things were good for me, but they didn’t make the world safe again. The crisis had stolen my peace and battered my heart. In the middle of the storm, I made some new friends. Anne and Martise had this sense of joy that didn’t depend on their circumstances. They had big crisis situations of their own, but they were neither fearful nor bitter. They were fun, loving and real.
I wanted what they had.
I remember one afternoon I had to go back to my locker because I’d forgotten my French book. Anne invited me to come with her and Martise to their church youth group. I wanted to spend more time with these engaging girls, so I readily agreed.
That night, the man who led the group talked about how much God loves us and longs for us to turn to Him. He wants to walk with us and help us and show us we’re never alone. God loves us so much He sent His Son, Jesus, to die for our sins. Because God is holy and just, we need Jesus to make us right with God. Jesus, during His time on earth, showed us the best way to live, by loving God and loving people. When we accept Jesus dying for our sins and agree to follow Him, we get the Holy Spirit to help us go beyond anything we could do on our own.
The leader, Russ, told us all we needed to do was to pray and admit our sinful nature, accept that Jesus died for our sins and choose to follow Him as our Lord. That little prayer opens the door for the Holy Spirit to come into our lives and help us become more like Jesus, loving God and loving people.
That night, I went home and in my little room, Bee Gees poster on the wall and Breyer’s horse figures on the shelves over my desk, I knelt on the floor in the dark and asked Jesus to come into my life. For the next few nights, I repeated the process, just to be sure. But God had already begun to work in my heart.
Russ – along with Anne and Martise – said that spending time in the Bible and in prayer daily was the primary way to grow in your faith. The Bible is God’s love letter to His people and the most consistent method He uses to speak to us today. Praying gets me to focus on loving Him and loving others. I can share what’s on my heart and sometimes I realize what He wants me to do.
Catalpa trees are in full bloom in late spring on Plum Prairie Ranch. The resident bees from the hive managed by our teenage nephew love their nectar.
Relationships take effort, whether it’s your marriage, your children or your friends. Why would we expect God to be any different? I realized early on that spending time with God helped me, especially in times of crisis.
Sometimes I get really busy or discouraged and my times with God get overlooked or abbreviated. I’m not perfect. That’s okay. It’s more than okay. That’s where grace steps into the picture. God doesn’t love me because I read my Bible. He loves me whether I read or not.
He loves me when I’m leaning into Him, hanging on His every word, and He loves me when I’m angry or distracted or greedy or a hot mess. That’s grace. We couldn’t earn His favor if we tried because then we could boast about it. A big part of following Jesus is dying to our selfish pride. That “getting over myself” may always be a struggle, but sometimes it’s surprisingly easy.
In the middle of a difficult or terrible situation, coming to the end of your rope can be a good thing if you remember God’s in control (“Jesus, take the wheel” and all that).
Because I love God, I spend time with Him. And because I love God, I try to love people. It shouldn’t matter if they look like me or think like me, God loves them all. And He calls me to do the same.
One of my favorite things about following the Lord is that He constantly renews us and always gives us something to look forward to in the future. It doesn’t matter whether you’re 5, 50 or 105.
“For I am about to do something new. See, I have already begun! Do you not see it? I will make a pathway through the wilderness. I will create rivers in the dry wasteland.” – Isaiah 43:19
How about you? Where are you in your faith journey?
Along the old property line running east-west through our slice of the Sandhills, soaring catalpa trees provide fragrant shade. “Give thanks to the Lord. His love endures forever.” -Psalm 136:1