A couple weeks ago I
was worn out. While still excited
about moving overseas, I was discouraged.
I could not help but think – this is going to take forever, we’re never
going to get there and if we do I’m going to be too old to fly!
Rationally, my
brain could chastise my heart and say “shape up Holly, God has perfect timing”
or “God has this under control”… but my heart just wasn’t feeling what I knew
to be true. Ever been there? So Grady and several friends and I had been
praying for an attitude change for me.
Zoom forward a
few days and you would have found me in the kitchen, washing dishes. Next up, one of Grandma’s big pots. And as I washed that pot back up to a shiny
silver sparkle, I could not help but be back in Grandma Unruh’s kitchen with its avocado green oven. Her arthritis was bad
enough that she sat and taught me, taste testing the mashed potatoes for
Thanksgiving dinner. Perhaps we needed
more salt, or another stick of butter (this is the Midwest mind you). Pies would have been covered earlier in the
week. If I was lucky, I had already made
town by then and gotten a lesson in rolling out pie crusts as well. (And probably followed the filling recipe
exactly instead of listening to Grandma about her slightly smaller pans,
thereby overflowing pie filling into the oven…)
Grandma spent
much of her life on a farm, but my memories are all of her in town, in a corner
lot home built by Grandpa with flowers and a vegetable garden out back. My mom, as a
little girl, remembers the day a traveling salesman came out to the farm and sold Grandma
all her pots and pans. She said he
talked her into hosting an event for her friends and he cooked for them with no
water in the pan! So many of our family and friends were
privileged to eat delicious meals made in those pots while visiting around their table. Now I am blessed to be cooking
out of them and hopefully continuing their legacy. And to be taking them to
Africa with me.
Back in my kitchen again, I could not help
but laugh to myself when I thought of how surprised Grandma would be to hear her
pots were going to Africa. Somehow I
doubt she ever guessed her little Holly, the one she had to chastise for doing
somersaults and handstands near the china cabinet, would be headed overseas. But she would be happy. Excited by the work the Lord is doing in
Mozambique.
And so, as I
stood there with that dripping pot going in the drying rack, God gave me a
gift. A flood of joy at the thought that
in many ways, Grandma is coming with me to Africa. In our pots and pans and most importantly
through my memories. I
just had to grin and dance a little jig.
Because we had prayed and the Lord had answered. It was as though he said, “See, I’ve got this. Everything is all lined up with perfect
timing, just trust in me.” And I could feel His peace.
(Although I
imagine my mashed potatoes could still use a little of Grandma’s tasting
expertise...)
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