Stump Grinder

Last week I talked about the disposal of tree stumps and the painstaking effort to get rid of them. One of our members told me about a stump grinder. This is a machine which is attached to the rear of a tractor's drive shaft. It consists of a large metal wheel with sharpened carbon tips attached to the wheel. As the drive shaft is engaged and spins, the stump grinder spins at a high rate of speed. You move the grinder to the edge of the stump and lower the spinning grinding wheel on to the stump just a and it then moving in one direction slides across the stump eating and chipping away at it a little at a time. One stump we were grinding was about 24" in diameter and within ten minutes the stump was ground down below the dirt line with nothing but mulch and chips left behind.

Just like the time it took us days to get rid of the stump we did by hand, the stump grinder has its own purpose to in ridding the earth of the stump.

An old elephant joke goes: "How do you eat an elephant?" "One bite at a time"

So too with the stump grinder, inch by inch it ate away at the unwanted stump. minute by minute we could see the destruction of the stump and at the end, no more stump.

In our lives we either ignore problems or we hide them, we can decorate them up so they do not look so bad, we can try and make them look not as dangerous as they might be but in the end, the stumps of our lives are still there. We can chop away at them and do everything we can to rid ourselves of these stumps that so easily hinders our spiritual lives, but sometimes it takes a stump grinder. Slowly, methodically, eating away at the stump till the stump is gone.

Hebrews 12:1 says "...we must get rid of everything that slows us down, especially sin that distracts us." So my question is this, are we getting rid of those annoying stumps that block our path from full fellowship with God, the sin that distracts us from better things and best things, the love of our Father God....?

Psalm 66:18 - "If I regard wickedness in my heart, The Lord will not hear;"