“Let all that I am praise the LORD; may I never forget the good things He does for me.”
Psalm 103:2
Sunset in the Serengeti National Park in Tanzania
Have you ever just been going along and all of a sudden a
smell or a sound instantly takes you to another time and place? It’s funny to me how God made us that
way. Our senses are very interesting
things. I’ve heard that smell is the
strongest trigger of memories. I found that to be very true yesterday. I walked
into church with some of my team to do a kids program, and a man was there
making church benches out of wood. As soon as I smelled that freshly cut wood
and sawdust on the ground, I was back in Mississippi in Papa’s shed with him,
playing with the piles of sawdust from his wood projects. I haven’t thought
about that in quite a long time.
PaPa has been with Jesus for about 4 years now, but I can
still see his calm, relaxed smile and his old truck with its wooden flatbed
that my cousins and I would ride around on. I can feel the breeze like when he
would ride me around through the fields and the woods on his 4-wheeler. He
would take me and my cousins exploring all through the many acres that he owned
and down to the creek to swim. We could play on the hay bales and venture all
through the old milking barn. We would sit in his chair with him and read book
after book. We loved the excitement of catching the new baby frogs along the
sides of the ponds while he worked on building his cabin out in the woods and
just sitting beside him on his swing and relaxing in the afternoon shade. He
absolutely loved grits and would always offer to make us a delicious bowl of
them. These were good times.
Sometimes I have an ice cold Coke and think of my precious
grandma and how she’ll have water at a restaurant instead of Pepsi if they
don’t have Coke, and it makes me smile. Every time I hear the sound of welding
(which has been quite often) and see the sparks flying from the metal, I’m
instantly safely back on my family’s patio with my dad’s welding and machine
shop across the driveway. I LOVE it. It
gives me a warm fuzzy inside and reminds me of where I come from.
Out here halfway around the world there are not many
familiar things. The cultures are very different. The places are new and
sometimes strange. The food usually isn’t what my mom would cook and the music
definitely is not what I’m used to hearing on the radio. Many times I just want
something familiar, something from home. Sometimes I wish that I WAS back home,
back in the States with everything that is comfortable and familiar to me.
Little moments like the smell of wood and sawdust, the sound of someone welding
and the taste of a Coke are gifts from the Father that minister to my soul in a
special way.
New opportunities, new cultures, new people and places are a
wonderful privilege to be a part of, and I’m so thankful for them. But I do
feel like the longer I’m away from home, the more the Lord is showing me how
much I have to be thankful for and how blessed I have been and still am. He is
growing in me a deeper appreciation for my lovely family and the way I was
raised. He is bringing to mind special memories of family and friends and home,
and I’m beginning to treasure them so much more now that I don’t have direct
access to them.
Thanks You, Jesus, for the bits of familiarity in such
unfamiliar places. Thank You for where I’ve come from, where I am right now and
where You’re taking me. May I savor it all and take nothing for granted.
– Jessica –
