Following Her Footsteps and Whispered Prayers

My sweet grandmother is transitioning right now from her long years spent on this earth to her eternal home.

If ever I've felt able to see that fine divide between the temporal and eternal, it is now.  Her fragile body has wasted away and her fierce and bold spirit is taking flight.

My grandmother accepted the adoption of this wild toddler and single mother into her family and her youngest son's life.   And, she prayed for me for 46 years.

I often wondered if she saw me as a bum calf brought in to be nurtured and grown.  Or maybe she saw me as fallow ground.  A garden?  An afghan or a sweater.  No, I was part of the legacy she would leave behind.

She well knew the struggle, commitment and sacrifice a healthy herd of cows or amber fields of grain took to grow.    She was the matriarch and the cornerstone of a family ranch. 

Her garden with its strawberries, beans, squash and veggies filled her root cellar through her nurturing touch and hard work. 

If any of her children or grandchildren were near her yard, we were looking for those fresh fruits under the straw she mulched her beds in.

Cookies were always in a Tupperware container on her counter and jars of pickles and jams in the fridge.  Her corner drawer was filled with a ball of rubber bands recycled from the mail, bread bags and twisties.  These bread bags were later filled with meat sandwiches and lunches to take to the field.

Going to the cellar to "grab a jar" of this or that always made me feel important.  Lifting the door and walking down the stairs to a musty and cold room, while keeping an eye out for snakes was an adventure.  Picking up those beautiful jars of summer was a joy.

Grandma, with her feed cap or bandana, driving a truck or riding a horse will always be a precious memory.

With even more tenacity and vision she had for the ranch, she brought her husband, children and grandchildren before her God.  She prayed.  And she prayed.  And she prays.

She sowed with God's Word and with prayer in to the hearts of her family.  Just as she withstood the heat of a canner or summer sun, she withstood many back breaking and heartbreaking times.  She prayed even if the pest of this world and of the enemy's plotting sought to destroy the spiritual crop she claimed.  She prayed, even when she could not see past the blinding snow of a blizzard or the spiritual battle raging around her.  She prayed when she was alone.  Alone in so many ways.

As she was involved in the exhausting labor of heart and soul in the harvest of the wheat, calves or hay, she labored for a spiritual harvest.   She will harvest the souls of many of her family and the legacy of a godly and praying woman.

As our precious Jesus multiplied the oil in the jars of the woman, He will multiply our Grandmother's prayers within the hearts of her grandchildren.  My sisters and cousins who seek to follow her footsteps and her whispered prayers.  We commit to the continued sowing, working, nurturing, praying, laboring and harvesting.

If my children, grandchildren and grandchildren will remember me as one who loved and prayed and labored for their souls...it will be a life well lived.

My precious grandmother, whose prayers will continue as incense before God's very throne is leaving her broken and exhausted body and stepping in to her eternal home. 

May God hold her beautiful hands and welcome her for us all.  May she look behind and watch the path and see us following up behind.