Great lessons can be learned from troublesome things..

I was blessed to grow up as the son of a small-time truck farmer who farmed with mules... Sometime about the time I was born my dad had cleared off a new ground... Those were times before large bull doziers pushed all the trees down and piled them... So my dad had left the stumps scattered all over the new ground and they stood there for a few years..

I started plowing as soon as I got large enough to hold the handles of the double shovel plow.. Only those of you who have had the experience will understand what it is like to plow over corn in a new ground..

As the mule pulled the plow along, we would be careful to go around the remaining stumps in the field... the plow points would catch on a root and stretch the root as far as it would go and then the root would slip loose and come springing back and whack the person holding the plow right on the shin...

The skin on the shin bone is thin and the bone is very close to the surface... Take my word for it... getting whacked by a root on the shin was painful...

Sprouts would also come up all along the roots and try to grow among the stalks of corn.. So... much time was spent every summer grubbing up the sprouts and roots in the new ground.. .. In the fall and winter after the corn was gathered.. we would dig around the stumps one by one and when they were loose enough we would hook the mules to the stump and pull it up and remove it from the new ground...

Much could be learned from working in a new ground... Our very best corn was always gathered from the new ground which was rich and fresh... But the sooner the stumps could be removed the easier our work became...

Young married people.. Sometimes you just need to plow around the stumps... But don't plan to live with them forever..

The sooner you can remove them from your marriage.. the richer your life together will become.. The same truth stands when applied to our life, our church or our work..

Don't spend your whole life plowing around stumps that can be removed.. is there anyone besides me who has ever plowed over corn in a new ground.. grin.. or grubbed up sprouts or pulled up stumps.. do you even know what a grubbing hoe looks like...:-)

Hebrews 12:15: "Looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be defiled."

And So Here I stand...