Posts from the Country: Adventures in Rural Living

By Rogene McPherson

In the biblical book of Ecclesiastes, for everything there is a season. A time for every activity under heaven.
Each of the seasons of the year, spring, summer, fall, and winter on a working farm tell a story. Posts from the Country is presented to the reader as one story for each week in a season, beginning with a true narrative of a grandchild’s plucking the heads off daffodils in All is Forgiven.
For everything there is a season to love, live, and work, all activities found in Posts from the Country.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Rogene McPherson
• Release date: Dec 19, 2021
• ISBN: 9781943027569

Rogene McPherson

As a mother of two, grandmother to six, and retired 40-year veteran in the field of education, this scripture is my voice and purpose. Watching my sons marry and provide a Christ-centered home for their own children, I believe my Heavenly Father also wants me to share with other families His truth and love.So, what’s next? As for me and my house, I choose to serve the Lord (Joshua 24:15) through writing as a means of lay ministry. And with prayerful consideration, I am writing two more books in the Meet Me series. In them, we will experience how Christ joyfully lived his last days and how we are given individual gifts as part of the family of God.

Book preview

SPRING STORIES

ALL IS FORGIVEN

No one picks my daffodils. To make matters worse, she didn’t even ask.

Then I noticed a small basket decorated with daffodils. A little voice offered, My bunny’s name is Daffodil.

Starting at the beginning, Emily, my four-year-old granddaughter, helped me carry Easter decorations upstairs. She soon found a light green stuffed bunny. No time was spent pondering as she asked, Can I take this bunny home?

I was the one who hesitated before giving an answer. Yes, I guess so, I responded, but you will have to take really good care of her. She belonged to my mother.

Even at four, Emily seemed to understand this was not just an ordinary stuffed bunny.

With the decision made, we found a small green basket just right for a six-inch bunny. I searched for bedding and found a white washcloth a friend had knitted, a perfect accessory for a bunny bed.

As the afternoon sped by, I noticed Emily walking back and forth to the daffodil patch. The theft was obvious when my beautiful daffodils were lacking flower heads.

A week later, Emily and I made pretend trumpets out of straws, pill bottles, rocks, fake feathers, pine needles, and lots of tape. In the fun I forgot to ask about Daffodil, the bunny.

I called Emily’s father to check on Daffodil. He laughingly said, Emily found a little wooden crate for Daffodil and set it next to her each night. Recently Daffodil was missing. Emily was worried until we found the lost bunny. She whispered to me, ‘Let’s don’t tell Grandma.’

What does this have to do with country living? Each fall I add a few more daffodils around the farm, often finding them in forgotten locations come early spring. Why plant daffodil bulbs? They are pretty, inexpensive, spread readily even in poor soil, and deer and rabbits stay away from their poisonous content.

Due to their hardiness, my daffodils will be spreading, blooming, and sharing joy for years. Old sagging fencerows often have daffodils blooming under rusty barbed wire, planted years ago by a homesteading family.

I enjoy my blooming flowers more outside than in my home. Thus, daffodils are not for picking unless you are my four-year-old granddaughter, who has already stolen my heart.

God is forgiving too. His Son has the nails to illustrate our freedom from sin. In Leviticus 4-5, God sees us equally guilty of intentional and unintentional sin. God found a way to eternal forgiveness of all sin through the shedding of Jesus’s blood and His resurrection. We are not to remain child-like in faith, but to grow in the knowledge and trust of Jesus Christ’s beautiful love.

Yes, I was slightly annoyed when I saw the missing daffodil heads. All was soon forgiven, just like God’s forgiveness.

Be kind and compassionate to one another,

forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you

(Ephesians 4:32 NIV).

SIGNS OF SPRING

The email said, Chicks and ducks will be in on Wednesday. On the following Wednesday I was at the farm store looking at the babies, only days out of their shell, wishing I could purchase a bunch.

No matter my age, seeing baby chicks reminds me of growing up on the farm, circa the 1950s. My Grandma Hannah always bought chicks at the nearby hatchery. Those baby chicks gave her egg money, an important resource for farm wives.

Early spring in 2001 we purchased baby ducks from a hatchery in Missouri. The plan was to build a duck house on the farm pond. On the weekend, the ten ducks travelled in the back of our SUV with the dog salivating.

Once at the farm, we sectioned off an area of the living room for their protection. This same back-and-forth routine occurred for several weeks until the ducks were large enough to be placed in our fenced backyard. I laugh now, but it wasn’t so funny then. I had only myself to blame as I knew how much work and noise peepers make. But I like babies of the fowl type.

It was Brendan’s senior year when he and his friends came up with a great idea. His English teacher used ducks as décor in her classroom. The seniors obtained permission from the administration to remove all the desks and put the ducks in her room early the following morning. When she opened the room, obviously it wasn’t what she expected to see. Senior prank, yes, but harmless other than frightening the teacher—one last time of fun as these students would soon embark on their new beginnings.

After the students brought the desks back into the room, the ducks on a field trip were carried to our backyard.

I am entertained by all of God’s young creatures, most born into the world during spring. Baby calves weeks old soon learn how to butt heads in a playful manner. Baby raccoons follow closely behind their mamma with the same distinctive eye pattern. Lambs with tightly curled hair arrive with long, fluffy tails. Goats learn jumping skills early and practice until exhausted. Don’t get me started on puppies or colts.

Easter occurs in spring, a time for new expectations and celebration, a time for reflection and repentance. Most importantly, the springtime of Easter offers hope.

In his [God’s] great mercy he has given

us new birth into a living hope through the

resurrection of Jesus Christ

(1 Peter 1:3 NIV).

MOONLIGHT AND ROSES TRIVIA

In 1979 outside a California city, a full moon made its monthly debut, slipping gently above the mountainous horizon. Beautiful yes, but no more so than when it comes up through the treetops from my east deck. The moon still shows its glorious splendor in Kansas hundreds of miles from California.

Not too many moons ago, I woke up in the middle of the March night. I believed it was already dawn. The intensity of the moonlight across the front yard was almost scary when I realized it was not morning.

How does God manage the sun, the moon, and the stars and still keep His pulse on every living creature? Does He even have a pulse?

Each month the full moon is given a name such as a blue moon, which means two full moons in one month. The second one of the month is the blue moon. With approximately twenty-nine-and-a-half days between full moons, it is unusual for two full moons to fit into a thirty- or thirty-one-day month.

Does God enjoy watching scientists come up with this stuff — this scientific information? Does God enjoy watching a full moon as much as humans do?

Here’s another uncommonly known fact. Someone developed a rose bush with bluish to lilac-colored petals and called it a blue moon rose.

Did God enjoy designing the first rose bush? Did He laugh when He put a lovely soft petal with thorns on the stem? One casual observer suggested the thorns ward off predators. If this is true, God, how come my roses take more of my time to keep them healthy than any other plants I tend?

Why do some people want to travel to the moon? Probably for the same reason some of us want to live in the country or a small town versus living in the suburbs or urban America. God created us with different interests, goals, and priorities.

We may not understand everything about God, but we can expect consistency. The moon comes up in full glory once a month. The seasons of the year change every three months. The March calendar shows spring as the third week of the month. This is the same every March, every year.

How else is God