What’s with the name??

Having just moved to the Raleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill area, my family will be living in the heart of Tobacco Road.  I grew up in Winston-Salem, the longtime headquarters for RJ Reynolds Tobacco Company.  I remember taking a tour of the manufacturing facility as a second grade field trip!!  They gave us little candy cigarettes as we left.  The candy even gave a puff of smoke when you blew through it.

My dad and many of my other relatives picked tobacco by hand and hung them in houses like you see in the picture above.  I vividly remember traveling to visit my Dad’s family in Ayden, NC.  After we passed Raleigh, the land was flat and filled with Tobacco fields and Tobacco houses.

Tobacco has gotten a bad wrap.  It is a plant that is a part of God’s creation.  The beauty of a particular kind of tobacco called “BrightLeaf” tobacco is incredible as it ages.  I believe that God put it here and that his creation is good.

Man has corrupted tobacco.  It was man that took a plant and marketed it to adults AND children (see the field trip above) as something that should be not just observed but consumed on a daily basis.  It was man that continued this, even when we realized that the abuse and regular use of tobacco caused horrific kinds of cancer.

It just hit me out of the blue one day.  God has redeemed me through Christ.  HE has made things right in our relationship.  HE continues to redeem (make new) my life daily.  God is also redeeming His creation.

Redemptive Tobacco just seemed to be a great picture of God’s incredible redemption.  Where we might expect it the least — I believe that we can find God in His incredible work of redemption.