beets

My friend is home from California, and tomorrow we commence in our canning of beets. Tonight I picked the most robust and will showcase them for you all. We have had the driest of summer's for PA, and so much so that the farmer's claimed defeat at the 4th of July. It has been dry, but at just the right time, we've received ample rain. The first rainfall was an inch and a half, and the other day we had close to four inches. The grass is green again and the garden is beeming. The beauty of Creation is overwhelming, and I ask you all, is it frustrating that you cannot capture and ingest a sunset or cloud scape? The moments flea, as rapturous as they may be, and how does one recall or properly praise Him for them? Also, how are sinful, foolish attitudes able to rule my heart in light of such immensity and grace? I cannot answer, and so I spend a good portion of my days arranging artful soliloquys in my mind that rarely make it out, and this week I've been smiling at Psalm 65.

Last year I meditated on Psalm 65 in a cafe with cobalt walls in Mammoth Lakes, California. The previous night we'd scaled the far end of Yosemite in a snowstorm and heavy fog, and this morning we crawled over mountain passes that made my little car moan. The verses "who establishes the mountains by His strength, being girded with might" resounded in my mind all the day. The mountains were craggy and severe, and for some hours I lost myself imagining I was in northern Afghanistan where the people live scattered at 17,000 feet. I envisioned the Hazara people in their huts cooking on smoky dung patties, discovering anew that a loving God had etched those foreboding peeks with His fingers. What joy would overwhelm such a soul. It overwhelmed mine, and I stared, lost in hope for those people.

The verse "You visit the earth and cause it to overflow; You greatly enrich it" (Ps. 65:9) came to mind with the rain this week, and it happened to be the Psalm on my yearly reading chart. "...The stream of God is full of water; you prepare their grain, for thus you prepare the earth. You water its furrows abundantly, you settle its ridges, you soften it with showers, You bless its growth. You have crowned the year with your bounty, and Your paths drip with fatness. The pastures of the wilderness drip, and the hills gird themselves with rejoicing. The meadows are clothed with flocks and the valleys are covered with grain; they shout for joy, yes, they sing." (10-13).