Planting.. My husband and I don’t always agree on how things are best done. We don’t agree on planting techniques. I like to plant seeds close to each other. I like the plants to be thick enough to cover the ground and help shade the soil from sunlight…he thinks each plant needs more space so they don’t compete for nutrients…he says they need room to grow and bush out.
Regardless of whose method is best, both of us have purpose in our planting. We don’t go with seed and just toss it out. ‘When a farmer plows in order to plant, does he plow without stopping? Does he keep on breaking up the soil and making the field level? When he’s made the surface even, doesn’t he plant caraway seeds…doesn’t he scatter cumin? Doesn’t he plant wheat in its proper place? Doesn’t he plant barley where it belongs….’ (Isa. 28:24) The ‘how’ is important.
As a disciple of Christ, I am called to tend the garden. Jesus said ‘Go into the world….go everywhere and announce the Message of God’s good news to one and all.’ (Mark 16:15 The Message)
I don’t live in Eden, but I live in God’s world, (Mt. 13:38)and there is soil to plow, fields to level, and seed to plant. There is a time to water. Paul planted seed, Apollos watered the fresh young plants.(1 Cor. 3:6) There is a time to remove weeds that threaten to strangle out the life of fruit bearing plants, but the ‘how’ of that is even another matter. (Matt. 13:29) Tending the garden is necessary, and the ‘how’ is vitally important.
I heard it said once that it is possible to beat somebody up with Jesus. I think there is much truth to that. Our mission is planting a seed successfully, and seeing that seed germinate into new life. I can shove a seed into a hole in hard ground and never see new life. I can toss seeds over sod so rooted with other things that the seed has very little chance of germinating. The technique (attitude), the ‘how’, …. is important.
Don’t misunderstand…a seed’s germinating is not because of me nor anything I ‘do’. God brings new life…not me. “It’s not the one who plants or the one who waters who is at the center of this process but God, who makes things grow. Planting and watering are menial servant jobs at the minimum wages. What makes them worth doing is the God we are serving..” (1Cor. 3:7-9 The Message)
“We are God’s fellow workers…” (1Cor. 3:9) It’s time to put on the gloves, get the how…I mean hoe….and get to gardening. The Son is shining !
