Is it just me or does anyone else find this sign hilarious? If you look carefully at the background, the thought does come to my mind that perhaps this isn’t the best place to advertise for a lush lawn and consistent irrigation. And how is our our backyard measuring up, before we spout off to others the ways we can help?

When are we speaking confidently, forcefully, as if we know what we are talking about when we should be getting out our ears, polishing them up a little, turning up the volume and re-affixing them so that their input can reach our brains?

When do I take off my ears and loud mouth when I should be asking questions? This is the question that the photo above blares at me, as if through a loudspeaker.

Today, in the prayer meeting, she mentioned how we can have the equivalent of pebbles in our shoes. Little annoyances that after we have been walking for a long, long time without a reset, will significantly impede our journeys.

Is it time for a rest? Time to allow another to listen to us, to lean against them as we rest, to catch our balance, and to remove the rock from our shoe, so that we can walk straight again?

Is it time to stop figuring out how to carry another’s burdens, and to relieve our hearts to a trusted friend?

I took her up on her offer and prayed aloud the concern that had been nagging at my heart. Not an earth-shattering prayer, no. Nothing about world peace, or global reform. Just a little concern about someone I love that has been weighing me down.

A pebble in my shoe.

And she took care of it. Gave me some clean socks in her prayer that echoed my heart. A few tears were shed. She offered me some water from her canteen.

We continued our journeys, her and I, each one travelling our own way, down slightly different paths. Our paths will merge again, and reconnect, but perhaps not until the next prayer meeting.

But until next time, next week, I got a little rest.

I felt better somehow, as we joined our heads and hearts together to pray about our unwatered lawns and shabby-looking backyards. It’s ok. God is growing a garden there, and he wants to grow flowers in the gardens of the people that we encounter, as well, as we are honest with others about our desolate backyards.

And I was comforted to remember the way to fix a broken irrigation system, a dry or non-existent lawn. The solution is to grab hold of a friend’s hand and to pray together, over that dry spot. To keep holding on when she shows you a dry area in her lawn.

To stop and pray together for a while, that the rains will come before we travel our own paths.

Sure beats trying to hide the truth, which is obvious to all who look carefully at my life, anyway.