For the last two or three years I have tried my hand at gardening. While I admittedly am not very good at it. I like the idea of planting a seedling into the ground with the children and watching it change over time. Now another point of truth, I get far more excited about this than my children. Maybe if I were more successful they would be more enthusiastic. However here is the Golden Nugget that you each need to take away about life. WHAT YOU WATER WILL GROW SO BE ABLE TO IDENTIFY WHAT IS GROWING IN YOUR GARDEN.
I have a few planters in my yard from years of attempts at gardening. This year my succulents are doing pretty good. However in the white planter where I try to plant some kind of vegetable there seems to be something that wants to sprout life. Now this planter has been dead since oh around the third week after Good Friday, yeah i killed them early this year. So a good amount of time has passed and I’m pretty sure that even the squirrels have stopped digging for whatever roots might have still been in the ground. This is a planter of barren land if you get my drift. Ok so as I stated my succulents are growing beautifully. There is a purple and green vine plant that i have pinched and made others. There is a plant that was dead in walmart that is now growing beautifully and she was free. There is a little basket of carnations that was on clearance at walmart. Finally there is one peace lily from my Grandmothers funeral that has had some rough times but insists on hanging in there with me and I am so thankful.
However now all of a sudden there is life in the white planter. I see this life peeking barley over the lid of the the planter and on hot days it screams water me. Now the sad thing is I’m sometimes tempted to do just that, Just because it is struggling for life it wants to grow and is putting forth its best effort to do so. But what if i did, what if i went out there all enthusiastic watered this unknown plant and neglected the plants I know. What if I watered and tended to and cared for that plant even though I understand it is a weed. You follow me?
Many times in life will tend to and water the weeds in our life and let the succulents die. Not meaning to let them die, we figure they can thrive and survive if we give the weed just a little bit of attention. We just talk bad bout our spouse to our closest friends and family. the marriage will survive. We just distance ourselves from our family, the kids won’t notice or suffer. We just feed into this addiction just a little every now and then it won’t hurt anyone no one will know. I will go to bed angry tonight but I’ll be better in the morning. Oh no? Not this morning? Or the next as a matter of fact the more i do it the harder it becomes to get over just being angry not even remembering what ticked me off in the first place but somehow i will get back to forgiving ol me. right?
Watering the weed just once can give it all the strength it needs to destroy the garden. My current trials and errors have taught me to better understand the nature of the weed. The weed was not creating to get a little light and die, or get a little water and die , the weed unlike my vegetables was made to endure and outlive and choke out any competition that is in the garden. As a matter of fact it can be so intrusive that the Bible tells them to leave it bc if you pluck out the weed you will kill the wheat. Meaning its best not to ever have weeds in your garden, to prevent them from taking root because once they do letting them live or die can destroy your harvest.
Its hard to remember that when you think a negative thought about someone you are watering a weed. Its hard to think that when you don’t pray for someone you are watering a weed. So many of us wonder why our relationships don’t work, why we can’t stop looking thinking the worst in others it’s because the weeds are being allowed to grow. However in our lives prayer and thinking on the good are the best weed repellents that we can have. I’m starting to really like the vine plants. It’s something about their beauty and they way the grow and spread that I find encouraging. Especially these last few months because I have been going through so much and trying to hold onto what I know is good and right even though some days I feel like I am losing the battle. The weeds of bitterness and resentment and anger are going to take over and who I have been for so long is going to lose. But I watch my plants growing and I see them stretching and reaching and holding on to every inch of space that is around them. My Grandmothers plant was looking dead and all of a sudden it rained and it was like it had new life spring from it. I speaks to me and tells me that even though I am in a desert a dry and painful place that the living water of Christ is all I need to refresh me and revive me. I just have to remember not to water the weeds and be happy they are in separate containers.
Be BLessed,
Riverangel42
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