Drawing from the Wells of Salvation

By Sherryl Hartlen

In a fresh, innovative way, the author chronicles her faith journey as a collection of stories, each complete in itself yet all bound by the common thread throughoutthat of our universal need for prayer. You will be amazed at how present you will feel as you read her story. It is candid and compelling!

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Jan 19, 2018
• ISBN: 9781973610991

Sherryl Hartlen

If there's one thing the author likes almost as much as writing, it is gardening. Sherryl enjoys the fruits of her labor while living in Fletcher's Lake Nova Scotia with her husband of 52 years, Gary. She is equally passionate about her family and prayer pursuits, all blessings from the Lord.

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Copyright © 2018 Sherryl Hartlen.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Scripture taken from the King James Version of the Bible.

Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked (NIV) are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The NIV and New International Version are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™

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ISBN: 978-1-9736-1098-4 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-9736-1100-4 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-9736-1099-1 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2017919448

WestBow Press rev. date: 01/08/2018

Contents

Prologue

Isaiah 12:1-3

Dedication

Introduction

The Open Door

My Mother’s Departure and the Schemitah

Biscuits and Doilies Count!

Dancing in the Spirit and Aligning Our Thought with God’s Word

Altruism

Generational Ties

Wilfred Wright and the Can of Beans

An Instrument for His Work

Upness

Preparation

What’s in a Name?

The Lady at the Curling Rink

Brooks

The Importance of Balance

Coming Clean

There Came a Fire

The Conflagration

Free of Guile

Israel

Carriers of My Light

Megiddo

Sunday School

Engedi

God Loved Me Before He Cleansed Me

Trees

The Big Picture

Ascent

Decimation of the Enemy

The Prophet in the Cave

Staying Our Minds on Christ

Rebuilding

Passing the Baton or Go, Team Z, Go!

More Than Enough!

The Lamb from Donald Graham

On Eagle’s Wings

Rest

Lifting Up a Standard

In a Garden

Divine Appointment

Does God Have Your Attention?

Whither Thou Goest

The Bucket

Lupins in the Morning

When We Give God the Glory

Spring Storm

Blessed to Be a Mother

Intentionally Attentive

Grace Brown and the Midianites

Send in the Reinforcements!

Hills

Little Ed, Bob and the Don’t Rush Me Syndrome

Dare to be a Daniel

Watchmen on the Tower

Jael, Jochebed and Jehu

More Are the Children of the Desolate

The Closed Door

The Blueberry Field and the Wonton Wrapper

Stepping into the Field

Poem: The Midnight Hour

Prologue

It was not my intention to give this collection of stories chronicling my faith journey as relates to prayer the title it now has.

But as in all else, the Lord has the final say and today as the last words were written, so too a new title was born.

It is fitting more than any could be for it speaks of the way I have had to draw from the wells of salvation, which is to say depend on my Lord and Saviour every step of the way.

May you be blessed as He pours out on you words He wants you to hear.

I am merely the one holding the pen. He is the Source of living water within which alone blesses us all.

Isaiah 12:1-3

"O Lord I will praise you;

Though You were angry with me,

Your anger is turned away

and You comfort me.

Behold, God is my salvation,

I will trust and not be afraid;

‘For Yah, the Lord, is my

strength and song;

He also has become my

salvation.’

Therefore with joy you will

draw water

From the wells of salvation."

Isaiah 12: 1-3 NKJV

Dedication

This collection of stories is dedicated to my husband and dearest friend, Gary, who stood with me from the beginning and is there with me still, cheering me on. Thanks for all you have done to see this writing become an online reality; without you this technologically- challenged senior would never have gotten to first base!

To Bryn Austin Roy and Krystin Margaret, the joy of our lives, and to Nathan, our only grandson, you as well as your families are what keep us young at heart.

It is also dedicated to two special pastors who have each contributed in their own way, immeasurable riches into our lives: Pastor Ted Yuke, founding pastor, friend and mentor since first we were blessed to know him, and Pastor Russ Conway whose desire to see the Good Ship Rock steady and on course is well-known. God bless you both!

Finally, it is dedicated to John Roy and Ruby Chaplin, the best mom and dad any child of God could possibly have and to my two brothers Gary and Stevie. So dear to my heart and sorely missed are you all; nevertheless, I am convinced we will see one another again before long around the ultimate supper table, the Banquet Table of the Lord.

Introduction

When I was a toddler my dad’s father, Joseph Chaplin (Grampie Joe to us) had nicknames for me and my younger brother, Gary. His was Giggy Rat. Why I’ll never know because he was the sweetest little kid anyone could ever know. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that when our grandmother left freshly baked rhubarb pies on the windowsill to cool, he and I would sneak around the outside of our 100- year- old farmhouse to the kitchen window where we would dig into the middle of Gramma’s pies until we got caught. He was the one who suggested these escapades, of course!

My nickname was no less unflattering, and in retrospect, no less telling. I was known as Stubby Scraplin. (No doubt because I was as broad as I was tall, at least as a toddler.) The Scraplin part I assume, was a play on words given that our family name was Chaplin.

The inference that I was a scrappy kid puzzled me when I was told in later years by my mom what Grampie Joe called me. I was anything but a fighter and quite polite, always wanting to please. As it turned out, Grampie Joe discerned in me at the ripe old age of two even more than he realized. I would have to call on that inner quality of determination never to give up no matter what life threw my way many times as the years went by.

There were times, however, when even scrappiness would not be enough to see me through the storms of life. I would need God’s help as I came to Him in prayer.

Allow me to share my story. It will bless you, I believe, as you come with me on this faith-journey with my Lord!

img1.jpg

Marker #1 Top:

The Old House Where I Grew Up

Bottom:

Giggy Rat & Stubby Scraplin on Old Wine Sofa

The Open Door

As kids when my brothers and I got a little bored during Winter months, if the day was sunny and bright, and snow conditions just right, we would beg our parents to grant permission to go sledding down beyond the Millpond some distance away. It was usually Mom we had to convince as Dad spent most of his time working outside during daylight hours.

As big as our property was, and as lovely to look at, there were no real sledding hills, not like the one down by the Millpond. It was long with a gradual slope, open field with no restrictions to slow us down, and best of all plateaued out at the bottom for a distance so there was nothing to run into which would cause us to hurt ourselves. We knew before we even asked that Mom and Dad would have no excuse for refusing to let us go.

The only catch was we would have to persuade Mom that we would be on our best behaviour, as we went beyond her sight, lugging sleds behind us, first on the Main Road for a quarter of a mile and then into Herman’s field.

(Herman had given us permission to coast there anytime we wanted, so we knew we were safe on that score.)

Aright, you may go if you promise to watch out for cars on the Main Road; they come around that turn by the mill pretty fast, she said with a worried look in her eye.

We’ll be careful, I said. We promise.!"

And make sure you check for barbed wire at the bottom, she added.

We already did. There’s no barbed wire there, my brothers explained. Herman took it down because he didn’t want his kids getting hurt.

My mother looked relieved. Well, the day’s awasting then, she said. You’d better get started. See that you’re home in time for supper.

I suspect the fact that knowing the fresh air and exercise would do us good, had something to do with her agreeing to our plan so readily. But we took it anyway.

The day was perfect for coasting. After our long trek to get there it only took a couple of hours to play us out, even with all the fun were having.

(I suspect Mom knew this would happen too.)

Coming home that day the air was nippy. Our cheeks, already rosy from all that coasting, were feeling a little numb, not to mention our fingers and toes as we made our way back to the house. I kept changing hands as the sled dragged behind me and watched for oncoming cars, keeping an especially sharp eye on my youngest brother, Stevie, who was always slow-moving because of being born with club feet and all.

I thought of that as we made our way up the steeper part of the Main Road just before reaching our house. I remembered Mom telling me how the doctor had said when he was born that he probably wouldn’t make it as his feet were curled around completely hugging into his wee body. He was born a few weeks early, she explained.

But then Mrs. Allie Dean who lived way up on the top of Cox’s Hill heard about little Stevie and what the doctor had said, Mom continued. And down she came, out the road right to our door, asking if she could help. She explained that she had acted as midwife during several births so your dad and I agreed to let her try and help. I needed time to get rested up myself so I was grateful for her offer.

She moved right in with us so she could spend time with Stevie and watch him more closely. Every day, morning, noon and night she unwrapped the bandages on his little feet, rubbed then to get the circulation going, put baby oil on them and then rebandaged them, pulling them ever so gently away from his body one small fraction of an inch at a time, until they were straightened out. It took weeks but Mrs. Allie never left his side till she saw he was well on the mend.

As she did so she prayed for Stevie to live and not die, over and over.

Folks at the church didn’t have much to do with Mr. and Mrs. Allie, Mom would always add. They considered them a little too religious, I guess. But if it weren’t for her, Stevie wouldn’t be alive today.

Then as an afterthought, Mom would say, I always kind of liked Mrs. Allie!

We were almost there and our tummies growled with hunger. We were hoping Mom would have our favorite supper cooked and ready to eat. Sure enough, we could smell it even before we opened the kitchen door.

So, when we crossed the threshold of our door at last, and stepped into the warmth of the kitchen stove’s wood fire, we were as glad to be home again as we were to leave.

Mittens were hung, with bits of ice still clinging to the woolen fibers, on the clothesline above the stove, until the drip, drip of the melting ice ceased and they started to dry out in earnest, ready for the next day’s adventure.

In stepping across that threshold, we had come from one atmosphere to another. From the frigid cold to the comfort of hearth and home.

So it is when we step through the Portal, the doorway of God’s Salvation plan. By saying Yes to accepting Jesus as Lord and Saviour of our lives, we step through The Doorway from darkness into light, from cold into warmth, from fear into the quiet confidence of faith, from death into life.

Jesus, you will remember, described Himself as The Door.

In John 10:7-9 we read:

"Then Jesus said to them again, ‘Most assuredly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep.’

‘All who ever came before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not hear them.

‘I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture.’"

John 10:7-9 NKJV

To find pasture to a sheep, literally means finding life as sheep can only eat one thing, grass.

So Jesus was saying, in effect, Come through Me, The Door, and I will lead you to life. Life that sustains, nourishes and fulfills.

Life abundant!

Jesus also said, "Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me."

Revelation 3:20 NKJV

In our parents’ bedroom, throughout all the years I lived in that century old home, there was but one picture on the wall. It was that of our Lord Jesus standing outside a wooden door, intently knocking, listening for a response from inside.

I remember reading about that picture once in a devotional book. The thought for the day was this. The door in the picture had no handle on the outside; therefore, by painting it this way the artist had depicted that we need to open the door from the inside.

He had thus portrayed our need to respond to the knock on our heart’s door by opening up to the One who alone can heal every hurt and right every wrong.

Won’t you open the door of your heart to Him today? If you have already done so, allow Him to come and sup with you, come and dine with you. Make Him at home. You’ll be glad that you did.

My Mother’s Departure and the Schemitah

Mercy is much on our minds this past while as we ponder its meaning and seek the Lord for life-application. At least that’s what is happening to me.

As a result, I am being urged by the Holy Spirit to share my story, beginning with the Fall of 2014.

Though I’m not sure of the exact time, I recall that we were being challenged by our pastor, Russ Conway, to get involved in classes teaching about the year of the Schemitah based on Jonathan Cahn’s book, The Mystery of the Schemitah which was hot off the press that same year taking the world by storm, both religious and secular.

I attended one or two of the classes and did my best to understand all that was being taught, but my personal life was in such shambles at the time that I couldn’t handle it. So I didn’t even buy the book or read it.

At the time, I was emotionally distraught for a number of reasons, but chiefly because we were having a real financial struggle compounded by the fact that my aging mother’s on-going health problems were taking a toll on our lives as we attempted to take care of her in her own home where she insisted on staying at age 92, despite our earnest pleas to come and live with us.

Following a 3-month hospital stay in 2013 during which she narrowly escaped heading into eternity, I set up a Home Care program for her with the help of the medical team at Musquodoboit Memorial Hospital consisting of doctors, nurses and Home Care specialists. This way, I reasoned, she could keep her dignity and independence for as long as possible while remaining in the home she loved.

In order for this to happen she would need a newly purchased walker to ensure her mobility, updates and improvements to her home including new flooring, bathroom assists, new outside steps which she could manage (with help) using her walker, a Philipps Lifeline complete with a monitoring device which would immediately contact me and the Emergency Response Team AUTOMATICALLY in response to the button pushed on her necklace or a fall, the force of which, we were assured would be sufficient to activate the call for help on the monitoring device without even the push of a button.

Because of her severe hearing difficulties my husband even purchased an amplifier for her home phone so she and I could carry on our nightly conversations of twenty minutes to a half hour. I can’t go to sleep until I hear your voice, she would tell me over and over again.

All of the above, as you may have guessed, caused us considerable expense in addition to the frequent trips through the week to ensure all was well involving the better part of 3 hours travel, not counting the time spent with Mom. We were also driving her to doctor’s appointments in Middle Musquodoboit and to Truro at month’s end to do her banking and shopping as well as taking her for drives every now and then for the sake of getting out.

Taking her to her favorite restaurant, Bev’s Diner in Upper Stewiacke every Sunday after church became our weekly ritual and offered us all a breath of fresh air from the challenges facing us, both spoken and unspoken. To our delight (and the staff’s) she always made it worthwhile with her quick wit and cheerful ways, always insisting on paying for our meal which became something of a joke as we entered each Sunday. The trip, however, meant driving to her house to pick her up, backtracking to Upper Stewiacke, then to her home again before we got her settled in and still had many miles to go before we slept at home. All in all, an exhausting pace and one which we knew instinctively that we could not keep up forever.

We began bringing her down with us for extended periods of time more and more frequently as well as taking her on picnics and longer day trips. One such to the Annapolis Valley was particularly rewarding as we encountered whole orchards of apple trees in full bloom in a few places. The hope was that we could convince her to stay with us permanently but gradually the realization dawned that this wasn’t going to happen.

She was adamant she needed to get home again after 2 or 3 days. Worse still, I began to realize my own health was in jeopardy as increasingly I was unable to help lift her from a sitting position to get her balanced at her walker without feeling dizzy and overexerted. Now I was scared! What if we forced her to come live with us (and the thought had occurred!) and I was unable to meet all her physical needs? Gary tried his best to help, but likewise has physical limitations, so we were left in a fix.

I decided to make arrangements for her to go into the Braeside Nursing Home in Middle Musquodoboit, the only one she would remotely consider going to as it was closest to home. She hated the thought of going into ANY nursing home but I finally convinced her that we at least had to apply because the waiting list was a year long, possibly two or more. But what to do during that waiting period? Now I was calling out to the Lord in desperation, Help Lord! Show me what to do!

I was at a breaking point in my health: physically, mentally and therefore spiritually; so fragile that I could barely keep it together for an hour, let alone a day!

So, when faced with the challenge of the Schemitah, I just turned and fled-the classic response when one is unable to cope.

Things continued to worsen with Mom so that every time we went for our weekly restaurant meal I wondered if I would ever see her again at the window waving Good-bye to me as we left. To her credit, she did manage to stay with us 6 whole days at Christmas in December 2014, but we both sensed the time was drawing near for her Homegoing. I think this is my last Christmas, she confided one evening as we sat on the sofa chatting as best we could with her hearing difficulty about old times and precious memories. And so it was.

Still she insisted, as she always had, that it was time to go home when the 6 days were over. Get the car ready, Gary, she ordered, It’s time to go home.

In three weeks time, she would be rushed by ambulance to the Truro hospital having fallen at home near the phone undetected by the Philipps Lifeline device and discovered by one of her Homecare workers who came on a regular basis to cook, clean and provide for her personal needs. I had been talking to her that very morning trying to persuade her to come with us to see the Dr. that afternoon as I had noticed during our visit to Bev’s Diner the previous Sunday and later as I helped her settle in at home that she wasn’t quite herself. Please let us come and take you, I pleaded but she wouldn’t go for it. I’ll be fine, she said resolutely.

That was Wednesday. I had been unable to shake the feeling that something was wrong since Sunday when we last saw her in her home. Odd, I thought. She didn’t even come to the window to wave goodbye.

The phone call came from an R.C.M.P. officer who responded to the call her Homecare worker made for help getting in as the door was locked, alerting her that something was wrong. We need your permission, he explained before we do anything.

Get her to the Truro hospital as fast as you can, I blurted. The ambulance is here already, he assured me. Don’t worry. She’s in good hands."

After ironing out a few more crucial details, Gary and I headed for Truro and made it just in time to meet her coming in on the stretcher, glad to see us as always, but with a messy sore on the right side of her forehead. I wondered if she had hit her head when she fell but she reassured me, No, she hadn’t. She had just lost her balance and fell, feeling overcome with dizziness.

What about this? I inquired, touching her forehead. Oh that!’ she said. It’s getting kind of nasty. Well, we’re in the right place, I said weakly, trying not to be impatient that she had flatly refused to come see the doctor with us. They’ll find out what’s going on." It would be many hours before the doctor arrived to confirm what the nurses had suspected; the examination and blood tests revealed that she had shingles, a very severe case of it and required immediate admittance to a hospital room. It also required strong pain relief which she had not been receiving until then.

At close to 4 a.m. Gary and I finally said Good-bye’ to her as she lay uncomplainingly in her hospital bed. She was handling this bravely as she handled everything else in life, I reassured myself as we drove home. She defied