| John 3:16 – “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son…” |
We are nearing the end of a record hot summer. I like to call it “El Horno”. (The Oven.) I have taken over watering the plants outside to give my wife a break. We recently noticed our giant crepe myrtle is dried up with shriveled blooms. I started giving it water, as I had not been. In a few days, it thanked me by displaying beautiful hot pink blooms all over.
My relationship with this plant began back in 1991 or so. I was mowing the grass, and right next to the fence, on the inside of it, was a “weed” sticking up above the grass. I had mowed over that spot many times before, but this time I swerved around it. I decided maybe I was wrong. Turns out it was a hot pink crepe myrtle, planted there by some bird, maybe perched atop our fence, and dropping a gift in this spot. It it as high as our house now, and beautiful. It is certainly worth a few minutes of my time with a water hose to keep it alive. It is a tad older than our first born son.
I have a pickup, Dodge Dakota, that was manufactured when Bill Clinton was president. It is the only vehicle our 25 year old son has ever remembered me driving. I have had it 23 1/3 years now. It has a cassette player (doesn’t work anymore), hand crank windows, and manual locks. It doesn’t need a backup camera because I can clearly see out of all the windows. It is a stick shift, with not a lot of bells and whistles beyond air conditioning. (I am not crazy, yes, in Texas A/C comes in handy). I took her in and had them appraised as my trade in. It got a good laugh. I felt I was abandoning her, as she has 275,600 miles. That is the equivalent of driving 11.5 times around the world at the equator. Like a horse you have grown up with. Hard to put out to pasture.
I can’t imagine someone else driving her. The A/C works, but you have to turn it on and off about three times before the vents will blow out of the right place. The first two times you turn it on, it blows out of the defroster vent. The radio works, but one of the quad speakers is out. The heater works somewhat, but not great. The headlight switch handle broke off, but you can just grab the metal post and easily twist it on and off. The glove box handle release broke, but I can open it with my fingers by twisting it just right. The clutch vibrates if you don’t accelerate just right as you go into first gear from a standing stop. These are all things you need to know before you jump in and start driving. Maybe that is why the appraiser only offered $600 for her.
Think about how well God knows each of us. He knows every inch of our life, what we have been through, and He cares so much that He invested His only son in our restoration process. Father in heaven, thank You for your great love for us, in Jesus’ name, Amen!
-Jeff Beall
