One place I continually see the miracle of creation is on my allotment. This is such a wonderful, peaceful place where God’s creation is continually played out before me. Make no mistake the allotment is hard work however it is enjoyable and provides a place of contemplation as I go about preparing, planting, maintaining, watering, weeding and so on in order to produce a harvest. I often feel God prompting me as I go about these tasks where I’m continually reminded of different biblical scriptures.
As I write this article we are currently coming toward the end of April in the UK and this is a particularly busy time for preparing and planting at the allotment. The short message below is something that came to me whilst I was preparing strawberry plants a few weeks ago.
Strawberries are an amazing fruit and loved by most people. As a plant the strawberry is quite durable. At the very end of the growing season it will die right back, but not completely. Over the winter months the plants appear almost dead as visibly there is very little sign of life, most of the previous year’s leaves will die, go brown and dry and fall away. Then in the Spring when the temperature starts to increase a miracle happens. New growth starts to appear and over a short period of time with a good mix of sunshine and rain the strawberry plants start to become healthy and vibrant in preparation for the fruiting season. White flowers then start to appear which will eventually become strawberries once pollinated. We then get a wonderful harvest of beautiful ripe strawberries.
The miracle however is not just in the production of the fruit themselves. Prior to and after fruiting the strawberry plants start to think about reproduction and start to push out ‘runners’ which are new shoots that can run for many metres. Once the runners find suitable ground they will root into the ground and produce a ‘clone’ which is a new strawberry plant. This is a miracle from God; Genesis 1:11-12 ‘Then God said, ‘Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds’. And it was so. The land produced vegetation: plants bearing seed according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good’.
In order to maximize the harvest of a strawberry plant it is necessary to do some ongoing maintenance. If watering, weeding and general maintenance were neglected then the likely result would either be a poor harvest and/or even a dead plant. This is also true of our own spiritual lives which if neglected can negatively impact on our spiritual growth, our relationship with God and the ability for God to use us to reap a harvest in His Name.
You do not need to be a horticulturist to know that fruit, vegetables and all other types of plants and vegetation need water in order to survive, it is essential. In John 4:13-14 in His conversation with the Samaritan women Jesus talks about living water; ‘Jesus answered, ‘Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life’. Plants may thirst for earthly water however, as Christians we should continually thirst for the living water that Jesus is talking about. This world has an abundance of reservoirs that promise love, self-worth and acceptance etc. however, these water supplies will never provide full satisfaction. When we feel that our spiritual reservoir is running dry we should search for living water, we should look for Jesus. He is the only way for our thirst to be fully satisfied, with His Spirit—if we let Him.
Weeds can be a particular problem for strawberries (and all other fruit and vegetables). It never fails to amaze me how fast weeds grow and how healthy they always look. Weeds compete with the strawberry plants for water, light and the nutrients in the ground therefore the strawberry plants do not get as much of these important elements as they should because the weeds are ‘stealing’ them away. Weeds are major competition to a healthy strawberry plant which is why they need to be regularly removed.
I am sure that the Parable of the sower and the seed in Matthew 13 will come to mind to many Christians reading this and the analogy that I have described above demonstrates well what Jesus was trying to say to His disciples. In the example above we (Christians) are the strawberry plants. If we allow weeds to grow around us which in our case could be sin, distractions or anything that takes us away from God then we are effectively giving these weeds the right to compete for our soul. They will be in completion with the nutrients we need for a healthy spiritual life. If we fail to regularly remove these weeds then we are compromising our ability for a healthy relationship with God because they could so easily take all our nutrients/energy and overpower us. In a worst-case scenario, we could even die.
To conclude, here is the good news. If you feel that your relationship with God has suffered because you have let the weeds of sin or the distractions of life over-power you then take heart. Just like the strawberry plants that appear to die off during the winter, it is possible for God to bring that plant back to life, to be vibrant and to produce an amazing harvest. Even where there appears to be no life at all God can revive a willing heart. All you need to do is repent, remove the weeds from your life and drink the never-ending flow of living water.
Isaiah 61:11 ‘For as the earth brings forth its sprouts, and as a garden causes the things sown in it to spring up, so the Lord GOD will cause righteousness and praise to spring up before all the nations’
Be blessed.
Author: Anonymous
May God bless and enrich your life
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Please feel free to share this article and other articles on this site with friends, family and others.
We can all become dry in our Christian walk, so it's good to be reminded that we can go to the Living water that Jesus gives and drink form His well. The weeds of this life just like the ones in the gardens will never stop coming, but we can keep pulling them up through living the Word of God and keeping close to Him. Great blog. Thank you. Be blessed.
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