Thursday, February 4, 2021 Honor Unto Whom Honor

by deborawephraim@gmail.com February 4, 2021

We could fill up the gas tank pretty cheap back then and the three girls had gone together and bought a cheap car

When I was young I was the youngest in my family. My sister was older, my cousin, Coco, was older, my cousins on the other side were older (at least for a few years). And those older than I at times pulled the ‘I’m older, and you have to obey me because…’. Depending on who it was it sometimes worked.

Coco was only a year older and when we were younger she was so close that she got her way mostly by being somewhat tricky, like changing the rules of the game as we went along.

Cousins—there was a time when people lived close as families and everyone was close in other ways. We have that idea, although I’m not sure how accurate it is. In our family, there was a time when we were that way. Then we grew up and left the home territory.

My sister married, moved to Georgia until her husband got out of the military. They moved to California where she stayed for the rest of her life. Only coming home on occasion. My cousin Coco lived with us at Grandpa and Grandma’s until she was in the fifth grade, then she went to live with her mother and step-father. A move that left me desolate since she was like a sister to me.

On occasion she came ‘home’ for visits on holidays and for summer break for short times. She would share with me different books she was reading and different classes she was in. She wore her hair long, down past her knees at one point, until well after she was married.

We had Virgil’s family as well. My sister and Virgil’s second son Mike were born the same month of the same year. They were quite close in many other ways as well. Then there were Virgil’s three girls. The summer I turned thirteen I spent over at their farm. During the days we worked ‘walking beans’. That meant we walked the field rows of soybeans pulling or cutting the weeds—mostly burdock out of the fields. We didn’t have gloves and didn’t have ‘hooks’ except for certain farmers, so your hands had to toughen up.

I made enough money that summer to buy school clothes and have some money left over for school expenses. We could fill up the gas tank pretty cheap back then and the three girls had gone together and bought a cheap car—well, it was cheap and it was a car, and that’s the way I remember it. We all went on our way eventually. And in some way, we were all mushed around like someone had taken a spatula and stirred.

I have the privilege of looking back, and just being where we are. My sister has passed and my cousin Coco and most of her family are gone. So, some of us are gone, and eventually, unless the Lord comes again before we expire we will all go the way of all the earth…

Do not let your time pass without reaching out to your past. Just this week I have had the privilege to talk to my Adorable cousin. We share a past that no one else could fathom. And most everyone has that privilege but too many wait until they can’t act on that honor.

Revelation 1:19 Write the things which thou hast seen, and the things which are, and the things which shall be hereafter;

Romans 8:25 But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it. Deuteronomy 31:8 And the LORD, he it is that doth go before thee; he will be with thee, he will not fail thee, neither forsake thee: fear not, neither be dismayed.