Special grace

You simply had to know. Most of those who traveled the two-lane highways I did across the state last weekend did know, I'm sure, and most all of them likely felt what I did, even though I never even lived on an Iowa farm. The fields from Alton to Waverly looked just like this--abundant, rich black soil the rest of the world would die for, perfectly manicured, rich ground expertly seeded, bare naked, Dutch-clean, gorgeous rich black dirt, all in place and ready to go.

Most of those who took Highway 3 across the state last weekend saw three stark colors--a spacious azure sky, thick, emerald ditches, and miles and miles of black soil, a world bedecked in black and green, nothing out there to grab the eye, just good Iowa farm land, dark and rich and freshly seeded. You didn't have to see what was there to know life abundant was just waiting to arise once again. 

Reminded me of a passage from a Jim Heynen story in The Youngest Boy. Goes like this:

The youngest boy was not big enough to drive a tractor, but he was big enough to stand at the edge of the oats stubble field to which the tractor pulling the plow through field. The oats stubble bristled like the head of a boy with a buzz cut, but the oats stubble was a dull color and definitely needed plowing over. The plot turned that dull oats stubble face-down and turned the black dirt face up. Back and forth the tractor and plow went until the entire field was a lake of fresh black earth. So much change happening right there in front of his eyes.

Some kind of wonder I couldn't help feeling.

Things won't be the same this weekend. This weekend, in all likelihood, there'll be thousands of tiny green troops in unending rows just now emerging. That'll be beautiful too, another kind of blessing. But last Friday there was none of that, nothing at all--only bare naked soil. 

I've spent most of my life in Iowa, but I'll never, ever be a real Iowan, a man who, some late winter morning hears seed corn rustling to get out of the bag and into the ground. I don't smell freshly turned earth. I don't know the ways of animals. 

But last Friday, driving across the state, I told myself that I've become enough of an Iowan to be blessed with what I witnessed through endless open fields of black soil. It was a once-a-year moment, a special blessing, maybe even something of what my father-in-law used to feel with the tractor in the shed, his feet up on the stool beside his chair because so much was behind him. He'd finished it up, all the planting, all those seeds starting to stretch their joints and muscles in freshly turned soil. 

Once upon a time, my ancestors fought about Grace (with an upper case G), differentiating two types--"common grace," of which we all are recipients, and "special grace," that ladled out only to believers. 

Such distinctions are difficult and risk being pernicious. But I'll say it anyway. Last week, with nothing to see but so much there all around, I felt as if I was the faithful recipient of an abundance of very special grace. 

All that land, just planted, was simply beautiful.