Feeding Donkeys

Across the United States this has been a wild weather week of freezing temps, ice and snow in places not usually found.  It has snowed in Florida and in Alabama this morning it was 19F/-6C!  A true winter wonderland of ice!

I have a welcome assignment this week – feeding donkeys.  I talked my elderly neighbor into letting me, on these exceptionally cold winter mornings, be the one to go into the field and feed the donkeys.  I take a hammer with me to break the ice in their water trough.  Doing this is a great pleasure to me.

I have a usual time to feed the donkeys but once in a while I’m delayed just a bit.  Even so, the donkeys are waiting for me.  In the afternoons I have a time that I feed them slices of apple for an extra treat.  They know the time I’m usually there, but if I’m late, I still find them waiting at the gate.

Blackie our cat waits for me, too, no matter if I’m delayed.  Every evening I take special treats for Blackie around 7:00pm.  The other night it was 9:00pm when I gasped as I realized I had forgotten Blackie’s treats!  I grabbled the bag of his tasty morsels and opened the door.  There was our sweet cat, waiting calmly on top of his house, showing no distress that I was late.

I am warmed to the depths of my heart by these donkeys and our cat who obviously trust  that I will come through for them.  They trust that I will be there no matter the delay.  It’s amazing to me.    Once again, nature has reminded me of something so important: the beauty of trust.

Last week I wrestled with some feelings of stress and frustration, all because of having to wait on something.  This something, I know, is of God.  He is arranging something there is no doubt, but it’s not coming to pass within my desired time frame.  He is waiting!  Why?  I have no earthly idea but that’s not the point, is it?  My time is filled with possible mistake, while God’s timing is always perfect.  He is never too early and never too late.

This morning as I walked over the road to meet with my donkey friends, I smiled as I felt the slightest warmth of the sun’s rays streaking across the frozen ground, shining over the donkeys and over me.  I poured the grain onto their feed  trays and broke the water in the trough for them to drink.  It comfortingly occurred to me that these donkeys don’t know the exact moment I’m coming on the scene — but they know I’m coming, so they trust and they wait.

This may be the first morning I ever prayed, “Lord, help me to be more like a donkey.”

“I am confident I will see the Lord’s goodness while I am here in the land of the living.  Wait patiently for the Lord.  Be brave and courageous.  Yes,wait patiently for the Lord.”  Psalm 27: 13-14