I actually had a good night’s sleep. 😊
That was quite a welcome experience. 🙏 I don’t usually do terribly in the amount of sleep that I get, but I don’t generally do well either, I don’t think?
Anyway, I think between the decent amount of sleep and having taken it easy yesterday, I was able to recover enough to have a little bit more physical energy to do things today.
Unfortunately, I’m still battling the heavy blow to my faith and hope that I took after reading a particular portion of an unfinished blog post a handful of days ago.
[sigh 😞]
But I guess it brings squarely to center stage the great question: Everything. Can I actually put everything on the altar?
I want to.
My heart longs for that.
But to do so with only a foundation of faith and belief and not absolute knowledge… that’s excruciatingly difficult.
I’m so quick to doubt. So quick to be afraid I’m wrong.
[I know I’ve written this many times. Sorry for the repetition. 😕 I think maybe each time I write it, it helps me pull thoughts together into a more coherent understanding for myself.]
The path I’ve chosen to follow, the path I believe God has directed me to follow, absolutely guarantees that I will never get two of the three biggest mortal desires of my heart unless I’m right, and there is a God, and He’s who I believe I’ve gotten to know.
The blow to my faith and hope comes, because it appears that one of my three biggest desires is now permanently lost for me regardless of whether or not the path I’m following leads where I thought it would.
That’s been… brutal.
So one seems lost. One is still possible, and one I have had, do now have, and likely will continue to have (gosh, I hope to heaven that it’s not taken away, too… though, because of my other struggles and fears, I often lose out on that one as well, because I get so weighed down in my sorrows and fears for the loss of the others, that I can’t get out and joy in the one I have available to me all day every day. 😕).
I just keep thinking… if I’m wrong, and there actually is no God, I will never get that soul-deep desire, even while every single day of my life it’s within my power to seek it out. But I don’t. Every single day of my life I choose not to, because I’m trusting the path God told me would lead me to the most exquisite joy.
I believe there’s a God. I’ve had too many experiences with Him to be able to turn my back on that belief and maintain integrity, …but I don’t know; and for me, where certain knowledge is not, there doubt and fear creep in.
I used to feel like I knew.
During my golden years.
I’d like to get back there.
But true faith isn’t built in comfort and ease. True faith is built through sacrifice. True faith is built when there’s a price to be paid, and you choose to pay it.
I’m willing to pay the price, if it’s required, though I’m scared to. I’m scared, because I am under no illusions as to the level of difficulty it has been, is, and will be for me.
I’ve been paying the price for nearly two decades, and I don’t know that it gets easier. It might well be getting harder. I don’t know if I can even tell.
Either way, I believe God will make me equal to the challenge, and I pray that I might recognize each gift He gives me through the process.
But today, and for the last handful of days, it’s been excruciating.
But hey, I can choose to be grateful for the increased softness, the increased tenderness this suffering works into my heart and soul. 🤍
With all my struggling, I didn’t really get much done today either. I listened to several talks. I veged on sports news and international news, tech stuff, and some movie clips, etc.
Got myself a bit triggered, but managed to stay clean in my pornography addiction. 🙏
On the productivity side, I mucked and dragged. I dug up some more cacti, two more blue flags back into the available pile, and two more orange flags set out to keep an eye on other cacti coming back.
In the process of dragging, I had to pause to move one of the hay tubs that was in the way of accessing some horse apples, and after moving the tub, I noticed that there was a teeny little baby rabbit where the hay tub had been. For a moment I wondered if maybe I had hurt it while moving the tub, and when I went over to it, it didn’t move at all. It let me pick it up without any fuss whatsoever, not even big enough, I don’t think, to take up the entire palm of my hand.
Cute little bugger. I stroked its fur for a little while and then, noticing that there was an adult bunny underneath a pile of wooden fence posts, I went to drop the little bunny baby off with the adult.
The adult turned out to be Curly. 🥰 And she scampered away as I placed the little baby next to her. Fortunately, she returned pretty quickly after I gave her space, and I’m guessing the little baby is hers, because she recently had some little teenies, and with her being in the area, I’m thinking maybe she was watching over her little teeny.
Anyway, I got some of my van parts organized, listened to more talks, created a Facebook Marketplace ad for the parts I’m not going to be using in Arkansas, and then spent most of the rest of the night working on the trench.
The trench has been slow, frustrating, hard work, but I finally made some good progress today, I think. Hopefully, the rainstorm that’s supposed to come tonight won’t wash away all my hard work. 🤞
The tamper broke, which slowed the work down pretty substantially. At first, I used my wooden handled sledgehammer, which took a significant amount of time, but at least I got some of the fill dirt crunched up into fine particles to better pack it.
I did probably 15 or 20 ft of trench that way.
Once it was all crunched up with the sledgehammer, I brought over a slightly tapered concrete cylinder that I think was from left over concrete that had been in a bucket at some point?
I brought it over to the trench, turned it on its rolling side, and then used it as a heavy duty rolling compactor, standing on it and walking on it as it rolled up and down the trench, over and over and over again. 🙃
Gratefully, it seems to have worked quite well. 🙏
Prior to that, when filling in lower spots, I was creating a wet clay paste, about the consistency of Play-Doh, and then setting it out in the low spots and covering the wet clay with dry clay, so that I could tamp it down without the wet clay sticking to the tamper.
That was working very well, until the tamper broke. 😅
After it broke, I continued wetting the clay and putting dry clay on top of it, but then I used the sledgehammer and the concrete cylinder.
I think we’re finally almost there with the trench. Almost.🤞
May the storm that I hear rumbling in the distance right now be kind to the trench while still giving the absolutely parched ground a well-needed drink (the fields are so dry they crunch underneath your feet). 🤞
Heather made me a smoothie and got me water, and Hans made me a tasty burger of some kind. 🙏
Texted a bit today with Cory and my mom about my struggles, and talked to my sister a little bit too.
I’m feeling a little better. Tried to fill my life with light today, and it helped me not get too swallowed up.
Only a few tears today. 🙃 Much better than yesterday.
Not sure what I’m going to do about going to Arkansas. The weather shows it being high 90s and even triple digits, and that’s just… brutal. They haven’t had rain for a while, saw maybe the air will be a little drier than it normally would be, but it’s still… brutal.
Not sure I’m up for it right now. 😅
It’s late. Time for bed. Almost 11:11.
G’night, y’all. 🩵
Lift the world.
Bring it on.
~ stephen
Lift the World 