itsawonderfilledlife

Ever feel crushed? Like the breath of life is being snuffed right out of you?

Haven’t we all?

This summer I have been aware of new things ripening. Not really new things, so much as renovated, renewed and strength that comes afresh from ones once stripped, pressed and crushed.

The other day I was watching a clip from I Love Lucy. Lucy had gotten a job stomping on grapes. As is common in her sketches, it was hilarious. Later that day my son introduced me to a worship song that had been sung throughout the summer at camp, called New Wine (video clip, below).

Wine is stalking me with deeper meaning.

As I listened to the lyrics, I smiled.

The making of wine has many stages. One cannot awake one morning and simply say, I am going to produce wine and have a glass by evening.

It is said that there are five main parts of the wine making process including: harvesting, crushing and pressing, fermentation, clarification, and aging and bottling … these don’t even include the processes involved in growing the grapes. The total amount of time from planting a new plant to uncorking the bottle can take five years (or more if aging is desired).

The grapes represented in a bottle of wine have been often been grown on hills, in the hot sun, cut off the branches with sharp blades, then crushed and pressed. It is what has developed inside of them, what has been pressed out of them, that is their finest fruit.

I look back at those times on the hot, parched slopes … when I thirsted for a fertile valley.

Those times that seemed to be death by a thousand deep cuts, draining my soul of it’s life source.

Those times when I was crushed, pressed … the times that dropped me to my knees.

Those times when I felt like a prisoner in a glass house … visible from the outside, but locked in tightly, with no one to pop the cork …

Then, the day came, the cork was released, and I was poured out … the new wine, made from crushing and pressing.

It is a new season. The strength, power and freedom of today is due to the crushing and pressing of many yesterdays. The new wine, made in … “your careful hand. When I trust You, I don’t need to understand”

Read Full Post »