A bit of Oregon…

 

A bit of Oregon…

My husband was born and raised in the foothills of the Willamette Valley in Oregon as were his parents, siblings…

They had an orchard, gardens…they started in a former chicken house, expanding it as time and money allowed…they had sheep, hair goats, chickens, pigs, calves…they cleared ground, sold wood for the many wood burning stoves that families used to heat their homes and cooking stoves…

they were the descendants of the Great Migration…Those people/families who came to Oregon to find land to farm starting in the 1840’s…they saw opportunities in the fertile soil of Oregon rather than the gold discoveries of California…it was their “dream land”…it still calls people to come and live, from the beaches of the Pacific on the west, to the high desert on the eastern border…

We lived there the first year of our marriage and then again in the middle of our marriage…and my husband died and was buried in Oregon…college students and caring for his mother as well as another stint in college…our children learned to log trees, drive tractors, avoid poison oak, grow Christmas trees, pick buckets of blackberries/fruit, care for the elderly…

Three of four children married Oregonians…

https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/a-thousand-pioneers-head-west-on-the-oregon-traill

https://www.americanhistoryusa.com/the-oregon-trail-and-its-migration/

There have been “great” migrations many times all over the world…people moving to new countries, people moving from the rural to the cities….migrations from war, abuse, famines, etc…to hopefully better lives…for many it has been worked well and for many it didn’t…

The Israelites, following the promises given to Abraham, finally made it to their promised land via slavery in Egypt, famines, sojourning in the desert for 40 years, wars, loss of generations of people…it wasn’t an easy task or journey…

We are on a journey of “migration “ as well…we are passing through this world, with so many lessons along the way…we have a promise of a house prepared for us in Heaven…we have a Tour director leading us in Truth, we have a Shepherd to lead the way…we have some news of what may be in the new “land”…and we have  a “free, paid-for  pass” to enter……we have  a Father  who will welcome us…

Thank YOU….

 “Let not your hearts be troubled. 

Believe in God; believe also in me. 

 In my Father's house are many rooms. 

If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? 

And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.

John.14.1-3

 “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. 

And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. 

You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you. “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. 

Yet a little while and the world will see me no more, but you will see me. 

Because I live, you also will live. 

Jesus answered him, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. 

Whoever does not love me does not keep my words. 

And the word that you hear is not mine but the Father's who sent me. “These things I have spoken to you while I am still with you. 

But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you. 

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. 

Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. 

You heard me say to you, ‘I am going away, and I will come to you.’ 

If you loved me, you would have rejoiced, because I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I. 

And now I have told you before it takes place, so that when it does take place you may believe. 

I will no longer talk much with you, for the ruler of this world is coming. 

He has no claim on me, but I do as the Father has commanded me, so that the world may know that I love the Father. 

Rise, let us go from here.

John.14.15-31

Spirit lead me…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ABWnLjXer10