Sittin’ Under a Tin Roof During a Spring Rain
Isaiah 4:6 ESV
“There will be a booth for shade by day from the heat, and for a refuge and a shelter from the storm and rain.”
I was born in the little community of Oak Grove, Tennessee, before Roosevelt’s TVA Project was complete. That means that our house was without electrical power. The nearest bright lights could be found in Nashville. That was about 50 miles away. Our home was also devoid of plumbing. We drank water from a well. I remember that my mother was very proud of her new gleaming white wood range stove. Our evenings were lit by kerosene lamps.
My father had been the local schoolteacher. He was the only teacher for all eight grades. He purchased that school when the educational district was regionalized. I was born there. Later, he became a lawyer, graduating from The University of Chicago.
Our house was located in the middle of a fruit orchard. The view from the front included a plain, small, white country church. My grandfather had been a circuit riding Methodist preacher. For years, he had ministered there every fourth Sunday. The acreage upon which the house was sited sloped gently in front for a hundred yards or so, terminating at the only paved road in our community (Tennessee Rt. 47). There, across the highway, stood a country store/gas station. My father owned it. The building was low and long. A covered porch ran the length of it. This shelter provided dry storage, day and night, for feed bags of various sorts. The building generally was swathed in colorful tin signs. None of them touted Coke or Pepsi, but I do recall some advertisements that bid the reader to “Drink RC Cola”. Atop the gas pump sat a large, calibrated glass globe. In order to dispense gasoline, the operator had to hand-pump the liquid from the ground into the globe. When the desired number of gallons had been transferred, the liquid was released and gravity-fed into the customer’s fuel tank. Most of the local folks visiting the store, however, were not borne there via automobile. They came in farm wagons drawn by horses or mules.
The house, church, and store were each covered in tin roofing.
As small children, on rainy days, my brothers and I would sometimes fashion comfortable places among the feed bags from which we would recline and watch the rain. Looking back across the road, we were comforted by views of the old church, the orchard, and home. The years have flown. Parents and brothers are now departed. The memories of those secure and lazy childhood days are now mine alone.
God is so good to us! He has provided so many rich and simple pleasures. Even the least of his children may enjoy them.
I have now lived most of life in the shade of God’s mercy and grace. The years have brought few worldly pleasures that quiet my spirit quite so much as the enjoyment of a Spring rain while sitting in the dry comfort of an open porch. A tin roof, in that circumstance, is a huge plus.
George Moore
Elder Emeritus
