How Does My Garden Grow?

My pastor talked about gardening today and it made me think. Basically, he was talking about how he thought he had bad soil because he hadn’t had much success growing plants in his garden. But then he was talking to a gentleman who began telling him how any soil can be good soil, you just have to dig it up, till it, work it, and sometimes add things to it until it becomes good soil. Then my pastor began relating it to our spiritual lives. Sometimes to get things to take root in our hearts we need to till it up. After all, our hearts can become hard rather quickly, at least mine can.

But this analogy didn’t stop there for me. I began thinking about the gardens that Matt and I use. We have two gardens, one behind our house that we dug and tilled ourselves, and another one at his grandparents’ house. This garden has been used for years and years and is extremely fertile. The first year we planted the garden behind our house it really didn’t do too well but the first year we planted at his grandparents’ house we got a bumper crop. Now that it’s been 5 years or so the garden behind our house has done much better. Last year we had so many green beans that we are still eating from the ones I canned. And of course the garden at his grandparents’ house is still doing well. As I was thinking about our natural gardens God made a connection for me. Matt’s grandparents’, by tilling and planting and working their garden, have made it not only beneficial for themselves but for their grandchildren. They have also “worked” their hearts and left a Godly heritage for their children and grandchildren. My parents and Matt’s parents have also left Godly and fertile soil for their children to plant in.

I think sometimes we get so wrapped up in ourselves…what works for me, how it affects me, whether I want to or not, that we forget we’re planting a garden for our children. My children will either benefit or be hindered by my “garden.”

Let’s face it, tilling, planting, weeding, etc. can be work but the end is extremely worth it and once we have invested in the first few years of work we really don’t have to work that hard anymore. The ground has been loosened; the old plants that we’ve tilled back into the ground have added nutrients. We don’t have to go back in and scrape all the grass off the top. Also, from experience, I know that the more you weed one year, the less you have to do the next. I want my life to be like that. I want to let God work in my heart not only for my benefit but so that I leave a heritage of fertile, soft soil for my children.

The next time I’m tempted to stuff that emotion or that anger. The next time I’m tempted to ignore the problem and hope it goes away, I hope to take a step back and look. If I deal with it now will my kids not have to? If I learn to trust God and His work in my heart, I am leaving that experience to my children because they will see the process and remember. Pulling a weed now is always easier than pulling it later.