Talked to my friend in Florida after supper. We played the What Did You Have for Supper game. I said, “I had pancakes for supper. You?” I can feel her smile through the phone. “I just had salmon and spinach eggs Benedict and coffee crunch cake for dessert.” Last week I had a bowl of lettuce one night for supper and she says, “Oh, I had a bucket of steamed oysters and some fried mushrooms.” Jesus, give me a break! Slap some peanut butter on white bread and call it supper. She’s always talking of moving to Roanoke but she’d have to have Burger King Benedict for supper here. I tell her that and she says, “I’ll pay you to cook for us.” Nope, I don’t even know what eggs Benedict is.

Opened my eyes this morning and I could see the beautiful blue sky, Father Sky’s bleached white fluffy clouds sketched sparsely on the blue sky canvas. The warm morning sun was filtering down through the bamboo canes so prettily. Another glorious day for me to make my own. I remembered a quote I had read yesterday that said, “Enjoy your life today because yesterday has gone and tomorrow may never come,” Alan Coren.

Been busy in the summer heat today. Finally pounded my cucumber trellis stakes all the way down in the ground and got several little runners to hook on the bars. The songbirds have been perching there all day fertilizing the plants. The cucumbers are full of blooms and I have two fingerling squash. Can’t wait till they they are big enough to eat. I love to watch their daily growth. Mother Nature is a wonder working her magic in my little garden. I hope some rain falls my way tonight.

God planted the first garden and he was a master gardener. In Genesis 1:11-12 we read, “God said, ‘Let the earth bring forth vegetation: seed-bearing plants and fruit trees, each bearing fruit with seed according to its kind.’ And it was so. The earth produced vegetation: seed-bearing plants according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good.”

God tells us in Isaiah 58:11 when we are true in our faith, “Thou shall be like a well-watered garden.” When we sink deep roots in our faith we find peace in God’s promises of continuous blessings. Just as a garden cycles through seasons, our faith grows and blooms as we share God’s harvest with others. A well watered garden of faith overflows with God’s love and grace.

Been thinking how we color the canvases of our lives this evening. We all have a palette of God’s watercolors. Every day we wake we have a blank canvas to bring to life with brush strokes of color. Some of us have peaceful strokes of color splashed happily across our world. Some of us probably have quick strokes of bold colors, hurriedly dashing through our modern world, stopping just long enough when we get close to the canvas to brush a line of color. Some of us with young children and all their extracurricular activities and commitments don’t even have time to pick up a brush much less paint. They splash splotches of color when they get close enough to the flick the palette near the canvas. Some of us experiencing unexpected illness have a dark colored canvas but a radiant rainbow can be seen peeking through the strokes of dark colors, a little touch of God’s holy light in the darkness.

We all choose how we color our day. When we don’t have a great day, we can make the day great by how we respond. If we appreciate all the small joys in our life, we can have a beautiful day. When thunderstorms threaten a day, we can remember rain cools the earth, cleans the air, fertilizes the gardens. And we might see a rainbow when the storm ends. These momentary struggles help us appreciate the wondrous days when life goes smoothly and there aren’t any rocks on our path to cause us to stumble and lose our way.

The trials we go through in life help draw us closer to God. The Bible speaks of three kind of storms in life: storms we bring on ourselves, storms that God causes, and storms that other people cause. The storms we weather teach us to pray and teach us to lean on the Lord, to rely on his strength and faithfulness to protect us. God gives us shelter to wait out the storms in life.

“If you want to see the sunshine, you have to weather the storm.” Frank Lane