Currant Preserve – The Mountain of Sacrifice - September 2020

It’s canning and preserving season right now which means that every nook and cranny of our home is fairly bursting with jars, lids, bands, and produce! Just when we get one type of harvest put away another is ready to process. Usually about this time, there’s kind of a healthy respect for navigating cabinets and drawers as the normal order has been replaced with supplies spilling out and over everywhere. Some in our house take it all in stride, others, not so well. Yesterday, we hauled everything to the storage area in the basement for a reset so that our study area doesn’t look like a cannery. Soon enough, though, it will be time for salsa, cider and Concord grapes. It’s harvest time...

On the west side of our house, my husband has a currant berry bush growing which is his pride and joy! It nostalgically reminds him of his childhood home. He cares for this bush with tender love and care.This year we somehow managed to have a bumper currant crop which yielded nearly three gallons of currants! The tricky thing about enjoying these little gems is having to remove the tiny stems from each and every piece of fruit. And since our currant variety produces fruit smaller than an average pea - removing the stems is tedious, and requires tenacious love. But this is the single one piece of vegetation that hands down brings the most joy to my husband. And so a few weeks ago, I settled myself in for a few hours of tedious, quiet work.

The gift, though, of having a few hours of this tedious, quiet work is that it holds a unique potential for opening the windows to our soul...way deep down. Sometimes allowing us the opportunity to catch up with some of the quietest whispers within us.

And so, I picked and plucked, hour after hour... with thoughts, dreams, hopes and visions racing and swirling through my mind. Some thoughts brought tears, while others brought smiles. And just about the time when I concluded I couldn’t solve all the mysteries of life, I began the arduous task of making the beloved childhood jam.

I set it onto the stove, added a few extra ingredients and slowly brought it to its first rolling boil, subsequently reducing the heat according to the recipe.  

About that time, a child called from the garage needing something for their tennis practice, I realized a hose had snapped in the garden, and a different child needed immediate assistance. Simultaneously, I caught a glimpse of a new set of beautiful, orange, sugar-sweet tomatoes coming into their bloom... and just for a second, I got lost in the garden as I stepped away from the stove and the simmering jam.

I don't really know how long I was gone from the kitchen... probably longer than I’d like to admit. But long enough for the jam to pass the gelling point and crystallize into a hardened sticky mass.

Quickly, I pulled the pot from the heat and without thought, poured the gelled mass into the prepared sterilized jars. Within moments, it solidified into a solid mess. In fact, after cooling, the substance refused to budge and everything was considered a total loss. The beloved jam - lost in moments. What should have produced beautiful, nostalgic childhood memories sat crystalized, hardened and useless in the garbage.

Of course I cried, while my husband graciously chuckled and shook his head in wonder at the mess. A year of pruning, care, anticipation, and harvest lost in a few moments of something beautiful processing too far. Something good moving forward beyond...

In Genesis, we read of Abraham… a man of whom it is said - he was faithful. He desired and loved God. God promised him that his future generations would outnumber the stars in the sky and the grains of sand on the seashore. Faithfully, he waited and watched for hope to spring forth from those promises. And year after year, no heir came forth.

And then one day, well beyond the usual childbearing years, the miracle baby arrived! Unfulfilled hopes and dreams suddenly sprang forth with life! We can only imagine the tender love and care lavished upon this long-awaited child… the teaching and training, poured out on this promised son!

And then one day, God spoke.

He asked his faithful servant, Abraham, to walk his prized promise up the side of a mountain and present him as a sacrifice…

And Abraham obeyed. Father and son… both weighed down with the supplies needed for preparing the altar.

They walked…
They worshipped…
They continued...

And the beloved son asked, “Father? The fire and wood are here, but where is the lamb for the sacrifice?”

And Abraham answered, “God, Himself will provide the lamb for the offering.”  

And as Abraham painfully prepared the altar, laying down each piece of wood with determined surrender, perhaps his greatest sacrifice might be found in his fierce waiting for God to provide? Of not moving beyond ...

Was his heart so attuned with a deep unwavering stillness that he was able to hear the whisper of God’s provision in the thicket... God’s finger beckoning him to come see...

The PROVISION.

Had Abraham stepped away from the fierce quietness of sacrificial worship, would the generations still number the stars? Should his sacrifice have continued beyond the call, would he have dipped into human performance for Jehovah Jireh ~ the God who PROVIDES ~ as the ram in the thicket watched from afar?

Even as we desire to bring God our best… a living sacrifice, we must stay alert to continually examine the motives of our heart. Something good - moving forward beyond... sometimes ends in an embittered, hardened mess.

Sacrifice - fueled by a fierce and focused faith.

One day, the Son of God, our Savior, walked up the side of a mountain. He, too, brought the sacrifice. The sacrifice of Love.

He continued to the very end so that we wouldn’t have to. He closed the gap we could never complete. He finished the work on the Cross so that we could have right standing with Him. He paid the price - making all our accounts good, so that we can be made whole in Him. He endured because we could not.

Jehovah-Jireh ~ the God who Provides...

He endured the rejection of God so we wouldn’t have to. He was buried in a grave and raised to new life so that we need never perform to catch his attention. To receive his favor.

He moved beyond that we might live free!

Richard Lovelace once wrote: “It is an item of faith that we are children of God; there is plenty of experience in us against it. The faith that surmounts this evidence and is able to warm itself at the fire of God's love, instead of having to steal love and self-acceptance from other sources, is actually the root of holiness: We are not saved by the love we exercise but by the Love we trust.”