Up the Road a Piece

5/3/09 Down the Road with Friends
I will be out of pocket for a few days so postings may be iffy. I’m going up the road a piece to my dear friend, Doris’, farm for a few days of R & R---not even a good cell signal there unless you stand in one spot. I guess I could traipse out to the high point in the pasture with my computer. I do plan on having lots of time to sit, with my Bible and my journal, on her big porch---I sense “Reflections from a Rocker” in my blog future.
Two other dear friends, Beth, who nursed me in Dallas during my first surgeries, and Winslow, who nursed me in Memphis between surgeries, will be there as well. Nurse Larry has a long list of instructions to give these nurses, including making sure I walk everyday and keeping me out of the sun. He thinks this will be good for me because I have to go back to the therapist on Thursday and my mouth movement/exercise needs a lot of work. I assume he thinks there will be lots of talking and laughing. Imagine that!
My grandmother, Mama Davenport, used to talk about people who lived in the rural part---I guess it was all rural---in Hampton Station, as those who lived up the road a piece or down the road a piece. Certainly there were no GPSs (is there a plural for GPS) and her concept of directions was the same as all the other folks who lived there. One family lived down the road a piece just past the clump of trees. I guess it didn’t matter the direction you were traveling because everyone knew where the clump of trees was just like they knew that my mother’s family lived across from the blue hole. I’m sure they had a street address but I never knew it.
All this to say that when my friend, Doris, and I talked yesterday, she gave me similar directions because admittedly she said, “I don’t know if you’re going east or west or even north or south, but once you go past Ida and Chris's long white barn (whoever Ida & Chris are) turn by Karen's store go on past the Methodist Church on Old Berlin Road and on past the sign, you know the kind that has a fire truck on it, you go on down the road as far as the black fence goes and there’s my drive. You can’t miss it.” I’d say that’s a sure thing except that Beth is driving, so one never knows.

What I do know---In studying Abraham’s life, one sees the total confidence that he had in the One he utterly trusted. The secret of this, seems to me to be an entire life of friendship with God. He knew God to be his good and faithful friend and he took Him at His word. James 2:23 says….Abraham believed God, and it was imputed unto him for righteousness: and he was called the Friend of God.
God’s word says:
• (Proverbs 17:17) A friend loveth at all times; (KJV)
• (Proverbs ) Ointment and perfume rejoice the heart: so doth the sweetness of a man's friend by hearty counsel. (KJV)
• (John 15:15) Henceforth I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you. (KJV)