God In The Backyard

 

All the houses in our neighborhood came equipped with a backyard. In fact, I don’t know of a house in my hometown that didn’t have one!  Backyards were just standard issue!  If you had a house, you had a backyard; it was just that simple.   

 

Our backyard was a place to play, a place for family gatherings, a place for conversations, a place to read, a place to eat, and a place to be alone with your thoughts.  But more than this, our backyard was my first classroom, and it was there that I learned the lessons that continue to shape my life today. 

 

As I grow older and reflect on our backyard, I become more and more aware of the lessons God taught me about himself using common, ordinary things.  I remember the huge magnolia tree that stood watch over us kids as we played.  It provided great shade in the summer, reminding me that God provides protection and shelter for us during life’s most trying and heated moments.   

 

My dad loved to plant trees and we had several fruit trees, including apple, peach, and cherry trees.  It was fun to pick the fruit and to enjoy it straight from the tree.  On several occasions, homemade apple pies were made from the apples we picked.  Those trees served as a reminder of God’s faithfulness in providing for our needs. 

 

In the back corner of the yard stood a huge wood pile.  In the winter, we would use wood from that pile to build fires in our living room and bring light and warmth into our house.  What a wonderful reminder that Jesus is the true light that no darkness can put out. I can still remember lying by that fireplace, basking in its warmth, knowing that I was safe and loved.  And that is when I remember that God is my refuge and in him, I am safe. 

 

We had a swing set in the yard as well, where we would play and where my mom would steal away to read.  I can still see her reading her Bible for hours at a time and I learned that God can and will meet us anywhere as long as we seek to be alone with him.   

 

There were honeysuckle bushes that marked the boundary between our yard and the Bame’s who were our next-door neighbors.  In the spring and summer those bushes smelled so wonderful as the fragrance of their blossoms filled the air.  I can still smell those blossoms and taste the nectar as we picked the flowers from the bushes and put them in our mouths.  What a great reminder to taste and see that the Lord is good! 

 

At night, especially on summer evenings, the backyard became my personal planetarium as I set up my telescope and looked into the night sky.  I would spend hours looking at the moon, or searching for Jupiter and its moons, or just taking in all the stars in the sky. I was reminded that God is my creator and that he calls all the stars by name. 

 

These are just some of the lessons I learned in our backyard.  So often we feel as if God is so far away from us and that we have to spend hours on our knees or in our Bibles to find him.  Prayer and spending time in God’s word are essential and we cannot neglect them. But while Isaiah 55:6 reminds us to “seek the LORD while he may be found; call on him while he is near,” we should not fail to see that God is all around us and can teach us so many things bout himself.  And sometimes the best lessons are found in our own backyards.