Deceptive silt

In Western N.S.W.  Australia, where I was born and lived for most of my working life  there are millions of acres or hectares of country that are used mainly for grazing sheep, cattle or goats.

Crops are sometimes grown in the more Eastern parts but the average rainfall is very low and unreliable and there are frequent droughts that sometimes last for years
When wool was a popular fibre it was looked on as ideal Merino wool growing country
The truck in the photo is carting wool from the“Curraweena” woolshed 80 km from Bourke N.S.W.in1951. In the 1890s, 32 blade-shearers were employed to shear 40, 000 merinos in this shed.
Most of the properties that don’t have bore water have no access to reliable rivers where livestock could drink, so contractors known as “Tank Sinkers” are engaged to excavate large holes in the ground for the storage of rain water. These excavations are called“Tanks” not “Dams” as a dam is associated with a creek or river whilst the tanks collect their water when it runs off small hills or undulations.
The photo here shows some cattle watering at a tank on “Carramar” near Gilgandra. On our property at Nyngan we were determined to not run short of water so had 3 tanks sunk that were 22 feet deep (about 7 metres) and were each 10,000 cubic yards capacity (8 mega litres) as well as some smaller ones.
Twelve years after sinking the first large one near our house we had a very prolonged drought but I felt confident until one day the pump stopped pumping water and I found that there was nothing left in the tank but mud. I shouldn’t have been caught unawares but I had miscalculated, not fully realising that on our soil type about 6 inches of soil containing leaves and dry grass is washed into the tank annually so the bottom 1/3 of the storage was just mud and rotting vegetation or “silt” as it is commonly known. Consequently a third of our water was missing.

This week I was reminded of this when reading a statement made years ago by the evangelist D.L Moody where he pointed out how our minds can become full of worthless things and thus have no room for God. He said “if we are full of pride and conceit and ambition and the world, there is no room for The Spirit of God”. But he also said “I believe firmly that the moment our hearts are emptied of pride and selfishness and ambition and everything that is contrary to God’s law, The Holy Spirit will fill every corner of our hearts”.

If we don’t filter the information and thoughts that are constantly fed into our minds, we become like our house tank; so full of rubbish that there is no room for the “water of life”. With the tank we had no choice but to let the silt come in with the water, even a silt tank in front was of little use, therefore I should have used a silt scoop to clean the tank out more frequently than I did even though the cost would have been considerable.

In our lives there is a parallel to this as Jesus came to “Cleanse us from all sin” (1 John 1:7) and when we accept that “cleansing” (that was also very costly to God) we should then endeavour to filter what comes into our minds afterwards, by obeying the instructions in Philippians 4:8 where Paul says “Finally brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.” As a matter of interest, how many T.V. programs have you watched that measure up to these standards?
The decision is ours: are we prepared to be very critical of the T.V. & internet we watch and what we read and listen to and say? If so then (as D.L Moody says) there will be room in our hearts for the Holy Spirit or alternatively, will we ignore Paul’s warning and fill our minds up with the “silt” that comes with the media thus excluding The Holy Spirit and by so doing say “good bye” to The Kingdom of Heaven? Matthew chapter 7 verse 20 is worth reading regarding this as it points out how critical it is for us to do the will of God in preference to our own will. Best wishes, as you consider this, Tom.

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