I have been struggling with this post, the one where I tell you about the origins of my blog name and try to honor this amazing inheritance of influential people and stories of my childhood that God has blessed me with. I fear that words may fail, but I’m going to try anyway.

I have a great inheritance – and no, not just the inheritance of Christ. But in the testimony and character of men and women who were placed in my life and in my story, who planted seeds of faith and hope and glory, who nourished, who pruned, and shined their warmth into my soul.

This analogy might be something only those who have experienced life with farmers and those who work with their hands can best understand; but life and love feel a whole lot like the smell of wet soil, sunshine, and a juicy orange on some warm February day in Tulare, California. Where you can smell the nearest dairy from a mile away and it’s surprisingly not as appalling as you expect … sneak into the cotton gin yard to jump on the bales of unprocessed cotton … and in the spring, you can eat half a flat of locally grown fruit in the time it takes to get to your house from the temporary strawberry stands that pop up on every corner.

You can almost feel your feet root into the ground when you grow up in a town like this, with a family like mine. And the roots run deep because of the stories that often go untold but seem to have shaped the very character of the community with its legacy of resilience and humility. They are the stories of my great-grandparents and grandparents.

I grew up hearing stories of their faith. Those who crossed over the nation during the Dust Bowl to reach the California Valley.  My grandma and her 13 brothers and sisters living in a cave during their journey. All of my grandparents experienced intense poverty – they scraped chicken bones clean, worked in the fields, picking strawberries, oranges, or cotton until their hands were worn and calloused.

My Uncle Melvin is a great storyteller. My dad’s uncle to be exact, but to say “My Great Uncle Melvin” never worked because adding “great” to his name made it feel distant – and he was always accessible. He was everyone’s Uncle Melvin or Brother Melvin.

He was known by everyone else as a preacher in the church my father grew up in, but to me he was just my Uncle Melvin, who was great at bear hugs, loved to sing Pow’r in the Blood with his deep and rich voice, had a really great yard, made for adventures, and every once and awhile paid us for picking up walnuts. I remember my Uncle Melvin taking over our Sunday School class for a month. Most of the time, he would tell stories from the Bible, paraphrasing in his own words because let’s face it, King James is not kid-friendly. But then there were times when he shared his own stories. One of those has always been special to me.

During the Depression, my great-grandpa took his family and headed west for more opportunities. They lived off the land as they traveled, and stuck close to rivers whenever possible to fish. You see, they were blessed with seven hooks and some fishing line.

And one day, my Uncle Melvin went with my great-grandpa to fish. He threw out the line and thought he had something on the hook, but all of a sudden the line went slack and the hook was gone.

This happened five more times.

Discouraged and frustrated, my great-grandpa knelt next to the river and they prayed over this last hook, prayed for God’s protection, His provision, and grace.

The last hook brought in quite a surprise – a snapping turtle, of all things. And in case you don’t know, snapping turtles were quite the catch for soup at the time. They were thrilled and thanked God for an answered prayer.

But the catch is this: the other six hooks were soon found in the belly of the snapping turtle.

I remember knowing as a child that this story was like magic, but real and true. It was like finding the Wizard of Oz behind the curtain, in all honest truth, but instead of being disappointed, I saw God’s love for us, His playfulness in showing His love in unusual and surprising ways.

I have never had to face a Depression like the one my grandparents faced. My faith has been tested, but not like that. I have been blessed beyond measure. Still my prayer for this blog, for me, and even for anyone who might read what I share here – is that we would be inspired to look for the ways God provides what we need in unusual places … through a song, a leaf, a shared story. Or even, at times, through seven hooks and line.