Down in the Strawberry Patch [Choosing Joy]

May means strawberries!  They are super healthy, super delicious, and even on sale at the supermarket!  However, nothing the grocery store carries can compare to the burst of sweetness you experience from standing in a field and biting into a just-picked, perfectly red, warmed in the sun strawberry!

I know that May is a crazy busy month but you must take a trip out Hwy 54 to Jack Hinton Road and Roberts Strawberry Farm.  You’d only need an hour total to drive out from Owensboro, pick a bucketful, and get back to town, and the best time to go is on a mid-week afternoon when the berries aren’t yet picked over by the weekenders.  We took our son strawberry picking for the first time this year.  Out in the field, my husband and I crouched low over the lush, green plants and parted the leaves to find the red jewels below.  Within 20 minutes we were not only filthy from kneeling in the dirt, but we each had a bucket full of lovely berries.  We looked up to see our son pacing up and down the rows with only a handful of berries picked.  We asked if he was ready to go and in a panic he exclaimed, “But I haven’t found very many!”  Our sweet boy had been trying to spot ripe strawberries from above rather than getting down and uncomfortable, pushing aside layers of leaves, and inspecting all the hidden treasures.

Sometimes in our journey with God, we keep ourselves at a distance, wandering around looking for the sweetness of life and only occasionally finding it.  But, just like in strawberry picking when we get down into God’s Word and God’s Will, we will most certainly get dirty, but we’ll also find a lot more joy.

“Keep this Book of the Law always on your lips; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.” Joshua 1:8 (NIV)