ROOTS...

Wow! What God, once again is showing me is so incredible. The other day I noticed these huge, ugly roots in my back yard.

Who put them there? I didn’t. I didn’t plant them; I didn’t nurture them; I didn’t even water them. Yet, they grew and grew and grew. It took my husband and an ugly, big, steel pick to pull them out. And let me tell you the process wasn’t simple. My husband had to break up the ground all around the weed, he had to dig and dig and dig. Then he had to yank, and pull and dig some more, and pull some more, finally managing to get the weed with only some its roots out. Then by hand he had to clean out the remaining roots on the ground, otherwise we will soon have more weeds.

One of the things the LORD showed me was that although I had nothing to do with planting this weed, I had a choice of whether to leave it there or to take it out. I could have said, “It doesn’t bother me”; “I can’t take it out”; “It’s not that bad anyway”; “I don’t want to bother anyone to help me take it out”, “It’s been there all this time, why take it out now”, etc.

ROOTS – deep, embedded issues, situations, etc. that have left their ugliness in my heart, in my life…

As I thought about this, the LORD brought to mind something I had read in the book, “Hinds Feet on High Places” by Hannah Hurnard

Chapter 16 – Grave on the Mountain

…they (Much Afraid, Sorrow and Suffering) found it to be some kind of stone altar with the indistinct figure of someone standing behind it.

“This is the place,” said Much-Afraid quietly. “This is where I am to make my offering.” She went up to the altar and knelt down…

She knelt there quite alone in the cold, clammy mist, beside the desolate altar in this valley of shadow, and into her mind came the words which Bitterness had flung at her long before when she walked the shores of loneliness: “Sooner or later, when he gets you up on the wild places of the mountains he will put you on some sort of a cross and abandon you to it.”

It seemed that in a way Bitterness had been right, thought Much-Afraid to herself, only he had been too ignorant to know and she too foolish at that time to understand that in all the world only one thing really mattered, to do the will of the one she followed and loved, no matter what it involved or cost. Strangely enough, as she knelt there by the altar, seemingly abandoned at that last tremendous crisis, there was no sign or sound of the presence of her enemies.

The grave up on the mountains is at the very edge of the High Places and beyond the reach of PRIDE and BITTERNESS and RESENTMENT and SELF-PITY, yes, and of FEAR too,…(emphasis mine)

After she had waiting for a little and still he had no come, she put out her hand and with one final effort of failing strength grasped the natural human love and desire growing in her heart and struggled to tear them out. At the first touch it was as though anguish pierced through her every nerve and fiber, and she knew with a pang almost of despair that THE ROOTS HAD WOUND AND TWINED AND TRUST THEMSELVES INTO EVERY PART OF HER BEING (emphasis mine). Though she put forth all her remaining strength in the most desperate effort to wrench them out, not a single rootlet stirred.

For the first time she felt something akin to fear and panic. SHE WAS NOT ABLE TO DO THIS THING WHICH HE ASKED OF HER (emphasis mine). Having reached the altar at last, she was powerless to obey. Turning to those who had been her guides and helpers all the way up the mountains, she asked for their help, and for them to do what she could not for herself, to tear the plant out of her heart. For the first time Suffering and Sorrow shook their heads.

“We have done all that we can for you,” they answered, “but this we cannot do.”

At that the indistinct figure behind the altar stepped forward and said quietly, “I am the priest of this altar – I will take it out of your heart IF YOU WISH.” (emphasis mine)

Much-Afraid turned toward him instantly. “Oh, thank you,” she said. “I beg you to do so.”

He came and stood beside her, his form indistinct and blurred by the midst, and then she continued entreatingly, “I am a very great coward. I am afraid that the pain may cause me to try to resist you. Will you bind me to the altar in some way so that I cannot move? I would not like to be found struggling while the will of my Lord is done.”

There was complete silence in the cloud-filled canyon for a moment or two, then the priest answered, “It is well said. I will bind you to the altar.” Then he bound her hand and foot.

When he had finished, Much-Afraid lifted her face toward the High Places which were quite invisible and spoke quietly through the mist. “My Lord, behold me – here I am, in the place thou didst send me to – doing the thing thou didst tell me to do, for where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried; the Lord do so to me, and more also, if aught but death part thee and me” (Ruth 1:17).

Still there was silence, a silence as of the grave, for indeed she was in the grave of her own hopes and still without the promised hinds’ feet, still outside the High Places with even the promise to be laid down on the altar. This was the place to which the long, heartbreaking journey had led her. Yet just once more before she laid it down on the altar, Much-Afraid repeated the glorious promise which had been the cause of her starting for the High Places. “The Lord God is my strength, and he will make my feet like hinds’ feet and he will make me to walk upon mine High Places. To the chief singer on my stringed instruments” (Hab. 3:19).

The priest put forth A HAND OF STEEL, right into her heart. There was a sound of RENDING AND TEARING, and the human love, with all its myriad rootless and fibers, came forth. (emphasis mine)

He held it for a moment and then said, “Yes, it was ripe for removal, the time had come. There is not a rootlet torn or missing.”

When he had said this he cast it down on the altar and spread his hands above it. There came a flash of fire which seemed to rend the altar; after that, nothing but ashes remained, either of the love itself, which had been so deeply planted in her heart, or of the suffering and sorrow which had been her companions on that long, strange journey. A sense of utter, overwhelming rest and peace engulfed Much-Afraid. At last, the offering had been made and there was nothing left to be done. When the priest had unbound her she leaned forward over the ashes on the altar and said with complete thanksgiving, “It is finished.”

Then, utterly exhausted, she fell asleep.