Tilling Up the Soil.

I was talking with a dear friend over tea a few weeks ago and sharing and crying and drinking from her as much as much as my tea. She is like a warm embrace, and spreads this easily to me and all the others who enter her door. Some nights there are cloth table clothes and napkins spread, and others there are grills lit or fires burning. Either way, the welcome is offered and into her hug I am given a home.

Well, this particular Saturday morning was rainy with an autumn brisk. It was perfect for the cozy comfort of her kitchen and watching her cook, with the lingering conversations of her and her husband. They are like parents to me, deeply respected and friendship woven through.

So I was asking and sharing and mulling over my soul. Expressing my ups and downs and letting it tumble out. Her gentle voice soothed over me and one expression has stained me:

"Christina, God is tilling up the soil right now, and the rain is your tears."

There was freedom given in these words. Something in it released me of my need and want and expectations, and let me see Gods use of me and this time in a different way. I have been wanting to commit myself, to plant and harvest and dig in roots. But my endeavors to do so seem to keep coming undone. So as I conveyed this, her words instead were given. They were grace to me. Allowing me to see something greater and be okay right now with me. To regard this period in my life as God tilling up the soil... which is he is. Digging and planting and plodding down seeds. Sometimes with gentility, sometimes with shovels and rotor tillers and plows beating in.

But either way, it made me see that God is at work right now, and letting that be. That in these times of devastation and concern and helplessness that I see, God is tilling up the soil and doing a good work in me. That he is preparing and pruning and scraping the soul. So it makes it easier to bare, knowing even in this, I am still in his care.