I washed the bunches and stripped the ripe grapes from the stems, dropping them into the cooking pot.
The next step was to stir, mash and crush the fruit. As I began the smashing process I was reminded of a line from a devotional in My Utmost for His Highest by Oswald Chambers:
If we are ever going to be made into wine, we will have to be crushed— you cannot drink grapes. Grapes become wine only when they have been squeezed.
sometimes everything in me
wants to scream
stop
no more pressure
God You will
crush me beneath
the weight of all this
then His voice an arrow
directly hits the mark
will you walk through
the pain
confess My hand
at work here, now
as I squeeze, release
not just stirred, but shaken
I pause, breathe
and surrender again
