As I reflect on Solomon and his teachings I want to share with you how I have come to find truth in Proverbs 3:5-6.
Trust God from the bottom of your heart; don’t try to figure out everything on your own. Listen for God’s voice in everything you do, everywhere you go; he’s the one who will keep you on track. Proverbs 3:5-6
After telling this story a few times I thought I would post it on here for others to be encouraged by.
A few months ago, after lots of prayer and consideration about how to use the 66 acres of land, the leadership prayed that God would send us opportunities to use the land to serve Kingdom purposes here in Denton. God is doing just that! He has sent us many potential partners such as Arms of Hope, a private Christian school; church of Christ based Christian living facilities, and others that may one day help us do kingdom work on the 66. He also sent the City of Denton who is in the process of paying us for easements to run some power-lines over our property. Not directly Kingdom work, but money to pay for that kingdom work. Not to mention he sent us a bank that would help us finances the whole endeavor.
One idea that had come up was the idea of doing a garden of some kind that could be used to help our benevolence ministry, our Saturday and Sunday meals, or even “Our Daily Bread,” but there didn’t seem to be anyone stepping up to pursue it and God didn’t seem to be breaking down our door trying to make it happen. But it did keep coming up in conversations. Then God came knocking!
Back in February, I almost overlooked an email from Healing Hands International asking Singing Oaks to partner in a sustainable agriculture workshop ending in a fruit and vegetable garden that could be used to benefit God’s work in our community. Now, I am not a gardener, and haven’t been one since I was a kid, but I felt compelled to bring it before our leadership and to my surprise they gave me the go ahead to pursue the idea. The “F.O.O.D Project” was born.
From here it was a rocky road with many unknowns and massive problems that needed to be solved. There was miscommunication about what HHI would provide and what I needed to get. On Monday, 3 days before the build, I finally received a good list of what was needed, and discovered that I didn’t have access to many of the things I would need. It was too late to call the thing off, and not enough time to pull this thing off. I needed manure, dirt, lots of wood, plants, straw, and many other things and I needed them in a little over 2 days. I had no clue how it was going to happen or where I could even find some of these items. But miraculously things that I needed started turning up. I needed lots of wood pallets, and unbeknownst to me there were 9 sitting on the back of our property. I needed Manure, and by Wednesday Morning 6 yards were sitting on our property. By Thursday everything arrived when it was needed. I stepped on property at 8:30am, and in an “I told you so” from God kind of way the last person drove off the property with a fully constructed, working garden at exactly 4:30pm.
Step forward to Saturday. There was still a water problem. There is no easy way to get water to the garden, though there is a very simple and easy system to get the plants watered once water is there. Saturday, college students, who couldn’t be out there to build the garden on Thursday, along with Casey McCollum, put a large water trough near the raised beds. Hopefully the trough will one day be used as a part of a rain water collection system. However, temporarily it will be used as a holding tank for water that will need to be trucked out. God Showed Up!
Saturday Night I drove over to the church to begin the process of filling the trough up with water. On my way I was still praying that God would find a better way to solve this water problem. When I arrived at the church I was met by two middle school students, Ryder and Robert who were excited to help me transport water out to the trough and learn about how the garden works. GOD SHOWED UP!
The following Monday a couple of us stopped by the garden to measure from a SOCC member’s house to the garden. They had agreed to let us have access to some water and I needed to know how long of a hose/pipes we would need to run from there house to the heads of the garden. It turns out over 800 feet from spigot to garden. I then decided to go over to the house closest to the garden. There I met a man named…Solomon. After introducing myself and telling him what we are doing he graciously and enthusiastically said that we could use his spigot (200ft) away from the head of the garden.
PRAISE GOD!
I don’t know where the project is going and each day I along with others have stepped out in faith not having all the logistics figured out or even an understanding of all the problems that need to be solved. But I share my perspective of this story with you to encourage each of you and to tell you that I believe in GOD and all throughout my life he has provided exactly what was needed when it was needed every-time I have asked Him to take care of it and lead me through it.
Find more about the F.O.O.D project at https://www.facebook.com/thefoodprojectindenton
