Dusty Roads

I am waiting for videos from AA's Easter Pageant to upload. They were too big for Photo-Bucket so I am using VIMEO but it takes a lo-o-o-ong time to upload a two minute video.

Anyway, I thought I would take a moment for a primer on life in these SOUTHEASTERN United States.

If you asked me my favorite season I would say Fall, without a moment's hesitation... I like rustic, I like brown, I like that all of nature is finally slowing down - (I am waxing poetic!).

But when it is happening, I love Spring as well. I just walk around with a slight sense of anticipation. My Dad was in management most of my life - and he has always referred to gardening as his "therapy". He just likes to see things grow. In fact he has been known to plow under that thing that is not growing, just so he can plant something else that will grow.

While I am not much for maintaining a garden, I do love to see things grow around my yard.

Despite an unseasonable spate of snow earlier this week, Spring has made her return and it lures me outdoors.

In my part of the South - however - we have pine trees. And this time of year, these trees dump an enormous amount of yellow pollen everywhere! It's enough to make one run screaming back inside the house!

Yesterday, I got home a little earlier than usual and decided to run. The frigid temperatures of earlier in the week had modified to a pleasant 65 to 70 degrees.

My driveway, our front porch, even our garage flooring is all coated with a layer of this yellow dust.

When I returned from my run I felt like the Pillsbury Dough boy's jaundiced evil twin - Pollen-Boy! I could feel the yellow dust in my eyes. Which resulted in my adopting a visage similar to the glare Clint Eastwood used to wear in all those spaghetti westerns.

In Georgia, it's just an annual event. For several days we see the pollen settle in like a lemon fog and we wait ... and wait ... and wait...

Eventually a rain will come and we will have custard puddles everywhere. And if it has run its course, it will be over. If it hasn't run it's course, it will start up again and we will again, look to the skies hoping for rain.

Perhaps it's good that the pollen-pelting takes place this time of year. I mean part of the ceremony surrounding the feast of Passover - involved enduring hardship - in the case of the Jews, they ate bitter herbs to remind them of the bitter times they had endured in Egyptian captivity.

They had waited and waited for God to listen again. Hoping somehow, He would come and wash away all their misery. Passover was the culmination of a number of events in which God did just that - He washed away their misery. In fact, as they were walking away in liberty, God told Moses He was "rolling off" the reproach of Egypt.

We who believe that Jesus is the Messiah, know that the Passover feast was not the whole story... it was just a "shadow" of what true liberty and deliverance would look like.

On the night before He laid down His life, Jesus participated in the Passover and again, gave His followers a "shadow" as He explained how the broken bread represented His body... and the wine - His blood.

This Maundy Thursday, we remember that He suffered and on Good Friday, the broken shell of His body lay in the tomb.

Those who followed Him waited ... and waited ... and waited....

afraid to breathe too loudly, afraid of what might happen next... waiting - hoping God would somehow wash away their misery.

Resurrection Sunday, we remember that He did just that!

As Jesus walked away from the tomb proving that He really was God and completing the transaction that purchased our redemption.. . .

. . . He literally cleared the air!