A Note From Tom: June 30th, 2011
Hey, everyone!
Hope you’re having a beautiful day today! I know I will! My girl’s comin’ home! She’s been gone a week to Texas to her mom’s family reunion in Lubbock (didn’t they just have that a year ago?) and then she drove down the flat, straight, hot highway to see Charlie, Sarah, and the kids in Midland. Then…today…HOME! Wow! I just miss her when she’s gone! Not that I can’t cook for myself, or anything like that. I really kinda do pretty good.! I’m just still crazy about that li’l farmer and all her farmer ways!
Speaking of farmer love…
Tina had to teach me how to do all her barnyard chores for this week while she was gone. She explained it, and showed me, and typed it up and printed it out. “Feed the chicken these things…the goats get that stuff…and hay…gather the eggs…water for all…oh, yeah. Don’t forget the dog. And the cats”. Even tho’ I’m not all that farm-y, there’s nothing I wouldn’t do for her! By Tuesday, I could do it all blind-folded!...with one arm behind my back! Who needs the print-out? I felt like I was rockin’ the FFA!
‘Til yesterday afternoon…(!)
I was about done…Just needed to put the scoop back in the goat’s garbage can full of grain and alfalfa pellets (did you know they need those?) and gather up the eggs from the coop…I lifted the lid of the goat bin and all curled up in there…a humongous snake! Yikes! I whacked at it with a hoe and it slid down to the bottom of the bin. Rats! Now I gotta get it out ‘cause I didn’t want Tina to have to look into that scaly, slimy face! So I dumped over the whole thing and it slid out on a wave of goat feed. Whoa! It was huge! It was like seven feet long! And fat! And it was acting all strike-y and bite-y! My heart was pounding and I think I screamed at it! I’ve never faced down a snake before! I whacked it with that hoe I had! “It’s you or me, baby!” Turns out I probably shouldn’t have tried to hoe it to death. It was most likely one of those good kind of snakes who munch on mice. But I didn’t know! I’m new at this! You know, nice birds and yucky birds are easy to tell apart (think about bluebirds and buzzards). It’d be good if nice snakes and the other kind didn’t look so much alike.!
When it was all over at the OK Corral, I realized that, if I had to, I’d even face down a snake for that girl in my life. I had visions of St. George and the dragon. But if I had known on Wednesday that I would have to confront a snake on Thursday afternoon (albeit a friendly, helpful, nice snake!) I probably wouldn’t have slept well Wednesday night!
As I tried to calm down and quit sweatin’ and shakin’, I thought about a Scripture from the Book of Revelation, chapter 12. It says that Jesus hurls down “that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray…” By giving His life and blood for us, our Lord doomed that snake… “He shared in our humanity so that by his death he might break the power of him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil— and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death…” (Hebrews 2. 14-15)
He knew that if He was going to rescue those He loved, He would have to face…and defeat…”the snake”. And He DID love us so much that He did not hesitate for a moment!
He came to our world.
In Bethlehem’s barn, He would “sleep in heavenly peace” even tho’ in that tiny, infinite baby heart, He knew already what He had come to do and whom He had come to confront.
And when the time came, He bravely faced that horrible serpent down.
On more than one occasion.
And in the end…in our world’s darkest moment…
Jesus won!
“Oh, how He loved you and me!
Oh, how He loved you and me!
He gave His life.
What more could He give?
Oh, how He loves you!
Oh, how He loves me!
Oh, how He loved you and me!”
By the way, I was shaking so much I broke two of the eggs on my way in the house!