Camels

It is time for another story from the ranch! Before we had the house built and running water indoors, we dug a ditch for the spring water to get to the pasture the cows were in. The pig’s houses were a distance away, about 250 feet. The guys working with my husband, would take care of that by using five gallon buckets to draw water from the ditch to put in the pigs troughs at feeding time.

Well one day they were busy with house building and asked if I would fill up the 75 gallon Rubbermaid container for them. I said sure and the ranch adventure begins! Recall it was approx. 250 feet from the ditch to where the container was by the pigs enclosures. Using a 5 gallon bucket, I’d walk down, put the bucket in the ditch and fill it up to about 3 gallons. (That was all I could comfortably carry.) One gallon of liquid weighs eight pounds, so that was 24 pounds sloshing 250 feet per trip. Needless to say, the legs of my Carharts were soaked by the time I was done.

Twenty five trips, 600 pounds, 12,500 feet later, the container was full. But of course, there’s more to this story. Our young bull had quite a playful side to him. He thought this was great fun. The first time I went down to the ditch, bent down to fill the bucket, he quietly sneaked up behind me and gently butted my butt with his head! I almost went head first into the ditch! I’m pretty sure I heard him laughing. Then each trip thereafter, he walked alongside of me, as if to apologize, which made the chore a great deal more fun.

So yesterday I was listening to the Bible while driving home, I heard the story of Rebekah in Genesis. Abraham sent his servant back to his native land to find a wife for his son Issac. The servant asked God to show him the woman who would be the wife, by asking her for a drink of water, to which she would reply that she would also water his camels. The servant had ten camels with him.

One camel drinks 32 gallons in one sitting x 10 camels = 320 gallons. Now if her water pot was two gallons, I’m just guessing because they carried the pots on their shoulders, that would have been 160 trips and 2560 pounds from the spring to the trough to fill it up with enough water to quench the camels thirst. I just have to say, I can relate!

The other part of this story that caught my attention was when Abraham made the request of his servant, he asked him to make a vow to carry out his wishes, by placing his hand under his thigh. Boy oh boy, put this story into current context and you’d get something like, “I’m sorry Abraham, that makes me uncomfortable.” Or, “You’ll be hearing from my attorney,” or something like that.

Back then it was acceptable. For when making offerings to God, the thigh (the literal thigh) was chosen as a sacrificial portion of animals, and was holy and sacred. So by placing your hand under the thigh, you are making a holy and sacred vow.

I just absolutely love the Bible and how you can learn something from it every time you read, or listen to it. God’s Word has something for every body. So open yours and find something of interest and how it relates to your present situation, and be amazed!

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