The Fell Walker Tea

Someone kindly bought me a packet of The Fell Walker Black Tea, a blend ‘chosen by Dorothy’. The taste is good, and the description delightful:

The large tightly curled ebony leaves, flecked with golden tips, brew a glossy chestnut colour accompanied by a smooth caramel aroma. The rich, coppery red liquor breathes malty smoothness and offers a characterful, aromatic and bold flavour.

Who would not want to drink this?

It turns out that Dorothy’s Teas was founded in 1984 by a real woman called Dorothy, a lady who lives in Lancashire North of the Sands, now commonly regarded as Cumbria. Having travelled the world, she seems to have been a pioneer in the re-introduction of loose-leaf tea as well as blending varying leaves to create new teas to her satisfaction, of which my Fell Walker is an example.

Before I came to Martin Top, I did not drink tea. With time’s passing, I have grown fond of the stuff, and this year, I even started going to the expense of heating the kettle and drinking it at home, with or without company. Yet this fondness is not a proficiency. I enjoyed Dorothy’s concoction of different tea leaves, but I am not expert on the different flavours and its ‘breath of malty smoothness’. I just enjoy the taste without mastering the complexities and subtleties of blending. I can safely leave that to the likes of Dorothy.

The more I read and study the gospel of grace, the smaller the sum of my knowledge appears to be. I have walked with Lord now since 1987, but I do not understand or fathom Him much better than when, as a child, I knelt by my bed and first called on Him. Yet He whom I cannot comprehend, I still love, and He whose ways are above my intellect I still yearn to meet:

And straightway the father of the child cried out, and said with tears, Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief. Mark 9:24

Lord, I understand; help my misunderstanding.

Lord, I love You; help my loveless heart.

Lord, I know You; help me to know You better.

Lord, I live for You; help me to live aright.

Lord, I trust You; help my mistrust.

Would you believe me if I told you that, like the father in Mark chapter 9, I wept as I wrote this? I had been attempting to think of why He would love such a one as me, but I couldn't come up with any reasons. Whatever our renewed intellectual brilliance at the resurrection, mastering the reasons for His amazing grace will still, I think, evade our comprehension.