Gardening

An early summer morning.  The dew is still on the ground, and the sun is peaking over the horizon.  Its time to invest in our summertime hobby, gardening.  There's a great satisfaction that comes from working with your hands and seeing the fruits (vegetables) of your labor. 

Gardening is work.  We invest a great deal of time and energy into our garden each year.  The soil must be fertilized and tilled.  It requires water.  Sometimes we have to remove the pests and diseases that attack our plants.  Then there are the weeds.  But in the end, there is the harvest.

Today, hoe in hand, I was working on the weeds.  One by one I chopped and pulled at each offender.  They had to go.  Why?  Aside from the eyesore they create, they can stress or choke out our good plants so we will have no harvest.

As I stood there, I realized we have weeds in our lives too.  Overindulgence, lack of commitment, a slack prayer life, lying, cheating, the list rolled on. 

What do the weeds do in our lives?  They make it hard for us to grow.  They choke out the fruits of our labor.  How hard is it for someone to see your witness with all the "weeds" in the way?  We lose our ability to grow fruit and harvest.

I'm reminded of Matthew 13 where Jesus spoke about gardening.  Some seeds fell on land not fit for planting, and they were eaten by the birds.  Some were planted too shallow and scorched in the sun.  Some were planted among weeds and the weeds took over and choked them out.  But the ones planted in good soil brought forth fruit, multiplied fruit.

Weeding a garden is a hard job.  It takes hours of time, lots of sweat and labor.  It seems by the time you get a spot weeded, here they grow again. 


The weeds of our lives are that way too.  They are often not easy to get rid of.  Sometimes they have deeper roots and stronger structure than the good things in our lives.  Sometimes they appear to be beautiful things, like morning glories or thistles.  But in the end, they have to go.  They have to go so we can multiply and be the person God intended us to be.  Only then will be see the true fruits of our labor.

What weeds do you have in your life that are choking out your harvest?

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