Old Fashioned Woodsplitting--When We Survey the Burnt Forest

Last Saturday we had an old fashioned wood-splitting in blackened Black Forest for two different elderly friends who were in need of firewood.

Several friends and relatives got together to work and help, including Jonathan's brother-in-law Jon McVey.

We got the firewood from a property that had burned in the Black Forest Fire, where the owner wanted certain trees removed, and he also permitted us to take some logs that had already been sawed down, since it was "going to a good cause," he said. 

Ben Reynolds had made the contact for us.

Jonathan sawing down the first tree.

The guys and boys sawed and hauled logs, and so did Rose.

It was great experience for our boys to learn to cut down trees and make sure they fell a certain direction.

 But did our coats and clothing ever get blackened! And you should have seen the boys' faces when they came home!

I had extra laundry to do!

Jon McVey hauling logs on both shoulders.

Sometimes we sit on the sawed off stumps of situations in our life, and survey the burned down damage of the trees around us.

This hillside looked awful. And right across the fence and driveway was a nice property that the fire had not reached.

Perhaps fire trucks kept the fire from spreading.

Sometimes it can be uncanny how a forest fire will burn one property and not another. 

And it can seem uncanny how certain things in our lives can be destroyed or burned down or burned out, while the same things in the lives of those around us remain intact.

We don't always understand what God is doing or how He is working or what He intends--except that we know He works all things for good to those who love Him.

All we can do sometimes after surveying the burned out mess is to pick up our axe and chain saw and hatchets, and start making good use of the blackened logs.

Our blackened logs and downed trees will cheer some hearth and fill a cold and empty woodstove for someone who is shivering.
And our blackened and smeared reputations and our dreams and positions and priorities that are now sawed down to stump size will turn into someone else's comfort.

We don't understand it all now, but someday God will make it plain. 

So we don't turn our backs on the mess.

We set to work with a will to gather the dead trees to burn in a friend's stove, and we plant little saplings to start a fresh forest.

We may never see the towering trees growing from the spindly stems, but our children or our grandchildren will.

So today, we work the best we can, taking strength and comfort from the sloppy joes and clementines in the lunch basket,

and from the Bread of Life that gives strength for each new day.

And we turn the results of everything--all the blackened trees and the charred remains and the sawed-off stumps--over to a gracious Creator.