Pop! Pop! Seal!

I am honored and excited to be a contributing writer at Sanctified Together, a woman’s on-line magazine created and designed to encourage women to support each other to live sanctified, set-apart lives where we are “not perfect, but we are righteous through Christ! Jesus did the most beautiful act on the cross — He died so that we could be beautiful in God’s eyes”(Sanctified Together). I would like to thank Alisa and Christina, editors, for giving so many women an opportunity to share what God has called us to write.

 

Hand-me down some summer-time, whispered some words within, words I had stored away, like canned tomatoes, bread and butter pickles, blackberry jam. Stored for a time when nothing fresh was available, for when winter snow storms buried us inside, to complete a dish that needed something extra.

Summer time is like that. It is a time for tending things planted, watching planted things grow, harvesting the meaty fruit and vegetables, storing to re-seed after the winter.

Springtime, new, sweet, eager, joyous – like when my time with Jesus was new. A basking in the cool warmth of a Spring sun. A scratching of the surface, tilling deeper, turning the soil of our souls. A re-birth, new seeds brought out for planting, a faith-is-the substance-of-things hoped for – these seeds.

Summer comes, a maturing time. A root growing time. A reaching deeper-to-the-center-of-our-soul time. A working time, an intense tending time, stretching our muscles, handling the heat, a constant loosening of the surface of our soul to grow more deeply, produce healthier fruit,  learning to protect from the burn, drinking thirstily of living water, a sharing and pouring time, a gathering time.

Summer ends as a storing-away time. Taking the meaty fruit of the word, storing it in our hearts, like canned salsa, snap beans and strawberry jam. Sealing it in a Holy Spirit Water Bath. Sealed and Saved to either share with others or for ourselves in winter-time moment of our lives.

The last two years, there have been winter-time seasons, when I had to reach into the pantry of my soul and pull out what I had gathered. Too weak at times to gather anew, wearied by gusting, tormenting, buffeting moments, I had to reach within and let what I had gathered sustain me.

Speaking faith to the wind. Speaking Hope. Speaking Love. Speaking Protection. Speaking The Word to my tormentor. Meaty, Fruit-filled, God-filled words. Spoken in the night. Spoken in the morning. Spoken behind a steering-wheel.  Gathered in the summer time moments of my life, His Words sustained me, reminded me, nourished me.

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