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Spiders and Miracle Cures

May 22, 2022 gregoryjoel

I came home Saturday from dinner with my wife at the rehabilitation hospital. She’s made incredible progress since her back surgery and should be coming home soon. My step-kid is out with her friends for a birthday celebration. The house was quiet. The dogs were happy to see me but quite content to remain comfortably splayed on the love seat and sofa. I made a pot of coffee and headed out to my chair on the front porch to enjoy the cool May evening brought to me by the cold front that blew in this afternoon. The northerly breeze chased away the record-breaking ninety-degree heat that made the last fifteen days drag on and on…

I sat on the porch for a long time. I was captivated by what turned out to be a tiny spider that seemed to hang in mid-air from my porch facia. He was so small I initially thought it to be the remnants of yesterday’s dinner for a much larger arachnid or maybe just a bit of leaf debris from the wind that had gotten caught on a strand of spider’s silk. I’d noticed it yesterday but let it be. Not so today though.

I went to clean the speck of hanging debris when suddenly it began moving across a very fine web draped across the expanse of the front porch. I stopped and was immediately intrigued by the tiny creature before me. He couldn’t have been more than a quarter-of-an inch in circumference even with his miniature legs fully extended. As he settled into the new spot on the web, he pulled his legs up close to his body and remained motionless; waiting for a dinner that may take hours to come.

I sat back down in the chair. This tiny speck had been hanging there for the last couple of days and I’d never taken time to see it for what it was – an intricate web wholly spun by a creature so minute I’d thought it to be airborne trash. It occurred to me how much wonder I miss in an average day. I’ve prided myself on being able to stop and see the magnificent creation God has made but lately I’ve suffered from a serious case of “busyness”. Busyness is a terrible sickness.

The last month has been filled with meetings, the hospital, classes, presentations, and struggling to keep the farm irrigated during the hottest start to May on record and severe drought. Add to those the normal farming duties – harvesting and selling at Cowtown as well as a new farmers market – and there’s little time to sit, write, and notice the beauty that’s just waiting for me. While all those things are important, I’m convinced human beings were never meant to multitask…

Take my teensy little spider friend. I’m not sure how long it took to create his engineering masterpiece. All I know is that it wasn’t there one day, and it was the next. It was singleness of purpose that brought about a small miracle. Spiders may measure time differently than people, for all I know, but I don’t know of any humans that could build such a marvel in one night. The world has an abundance of such marvels. Many of them right outside my front door.

This morning I decide to take a moment to sit, enjoy my coffee, and put all else to the side. Busyness fights me all the way, but I need the medicine of quiet and relaxation to stop and take in this day that the Lord has made. Listening and watching one of God’s tiny, overlooked creatures put things in perspective – at least for today. What’s on your front porch?

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Joel Says…

February 6, 2022 gregoryjoel

It’s an exceptionally brilliant sunny morning here in Cowtown. The sun reflecting off the snow-covered lawns makes everything brighter. It won’t stick around too long as the forecast calls for a warming trend this coming week. The long-awaited precipitation is welcome news to Opal’s Farm and the rest of North Central Texas. We’re moving deeper into a drought phase, so even snow and ice are welcome (if the power stays on anyway…)

Most folks here were not looking forward to this recent cold snap. The power outages, broken pipes, water shortages, and deaths from last year’s major freeze were still too fresh. Everyone was afraid of a repeat this year. The rest of the country must’ve been watching as well. Momma called from Kentucky to make sure we were okay – North Texas made the national news. I’m somewhat embarrassed that everyone doubts Texans can survive a couple of inches of snow and freezing temperatures, but after last year I understand.

The ice and snow are on there way out and it’ll be seventy degrees by next weekend. Our family stayed warm with no power outages, broken pipes, or water shutoffs. The winter crops survived the cold and life goes on here in Cowtown. If truth be told, a couple of days of Arctic blast just aren’t that big of a deal, but I’m grateful to be inside this morning and to have time to read and write…

I reread the Book of Joel for this morning’s meditation. When I was a kid, I very proudly told everyone that our family was in the Bible. I made up a lot of stories about my heritage and who I was so I could feel some value to my schoolmates. I may not have known much about my birth family when I was a kid, so I embellished the lineage of my adopted one. That’s another story for another day…

Back to the Book of Joel…

Joel is probably one of the truly “minor” minor prophets. He doesn’t talk about exciting things like invading foreign powers or wars, you know, the big stuff. Instead, he writes about an invasion of locusts that have left the country destitute and hungry. His story would likely be buried a few pages deep in today’s newspapers. Bugs and hungry people don’t sell advertising very well, particularly when they’re somewhere “over there”. Honestly, I never paid him much mind even if we did share a name.

(Aside – As an adult I now know I’m completely unrelated to him. His father’s name was Pethuel. There is no one in my family tree by that name…)

Locust swarms aren’t a large concern here in Texas like they are in the Middle East and Africa. We had a serious bout with grasshoppers and couple of year ago – that was bad enough – but they didn’t put a huge dent in our harvests at Opal’s Farm. It was annoying to walk the rows and be hit by large, jumping grasshoppers or throw peas away because they’d been chewed on: I can’t imagine what it must be like to have swarms so big they block out the sun, hinder movement, and eat everything in sight like they do in other parts of the world.

Joel’s words echo today. Substitute climate change or social justice for the plague of locust and not much has changed in 2500 years. I watch the news – wildfires that grow bigger each year, hungry kids, systemic racism, and raging pandemics. I can easily echo Joel’s initial despair.

“God! I pray and cry out to you! The fields are burning up. The country is a dust bowl, forest and prairie fires rage unchecked. Wild animals dying of thirst, looking to you for a drink. Springs and streams are dried up. The whole country is burning up. Joel 1.19-20

“Shake the country up… A black day! A doomsday! Clouds with no silver lining!” Joel 2.1-2

It’s a bleak picture, but…

“But there’s also this, it’s not too late – God’s personal message! – ‘Come back to me and really mean it! Come fasting and weeping, sorry for your sins!’ Change your life, not just your clothes…

Fear not Earth! Be glad and celebrate! God has done great things. He’s giving you a teacher to train you how to live right” Joel 2.12-13, 21-23

“I will pour out my Spirit on every kind of people… Whoever calls, Help, God! Gets help. Joel 2. 28,31 (The Message)

Joel offers choices and hope for what appears to be a bleak future. That’s what I hope to do today. Take actions that offer hope – whether it be the regenerative farming we practice at Opal’s Farm or the unity we try to build in the fight against racism and hate.

I know I’m not alone either and that’s gives me hope.