An Announcement!!!
Before I get to my weekly post, I would like to announce my
next series…with all this talk about fruit, gardening and spiritual growth I
think it pertinent to continue that theme and dig into the Fruit of the Spirit.
We all produce fruit of some kind, and that fruit shows who we follow. The
Fruit of the Spirit comes from a life absorbed in the Kingdom of God
Spiritual Gardening
My kids love listening to the Secret Garden
Our spiritual lives are like a garden in many ways. First,
the “seed” of the Gospel is planted in our hearts. It then germinates and
begins to grow until it reaches maturity and produces fruit. If we take care of
it, it produces abundant fruit, but if we neglect it, it withers.
Matthew 13:31-32 New American Standard Bible (NASB)
He presented another parable to them,
saying, “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man
took and sowed in his field; and this is smaller than
all other seeds, but when it is full grown, it is larger than the
garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come
and nest in its branches.”
God’s Word and truth work this way in the collective church
as a whole, but also in our lives as individuals. But there are several things
necessary after salvation.
Primary Care
First, all gardens must be tended. This is known by every
farmer, gardener and even some who do neither. A garden requires work and care.
The plants, whether flowers, fruit or vegetables must be watered. Without water
they will die. In the same way, the faith growing in our hearts must be watered
or it will die. We have Christ in us when we are saved but if we do not go to Him regularly, our souls will dry
up. Even if we never lose our salvation (I will not debate whether this is
possible or not) we will live miserable, fruitless lives, as Christians.
Eventually we will get used to the dryness, learning to ignore or placate it
with worldly means of satisfaction, but those are temporary and no matter how
much we try to convince ourselves it is fine, it really isn’t. We need to seek
the life-giving water Jesus offers.
John 4:13-14 New American Standard Bible (NASB)
Jesus answered and said to
her, “Everyone who drinks of this (well) water will thirst again; but
whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall never thirst; but
the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water springing up
to eternal life.”
Necessary Maintenance
Gardens also require cultivation.
According to dictionary.com a weed is “a valueless plant growing wild,
especially one that grows on cultivated ground to the exclusion or injury of
the desired crop; any undesirable or troublesome plant, especially one that
grows profusely where it is not wanted.” Weeds are plants of opportunity; they
are unwanted, unfruitful, even harmful to good plants, and next to impossible
to get rid of. They drain the life out of the garden plants and keep them from
producing, the bane of every gardener and farmer. It requires regular tilling
and cultivation to keep the weeds from taking over. It requires working the
soil, pulling up the weeds before they seed if possible, and disposing of said
weeds before they can produce further disastrous progeny. The more diligent one
is in tilling and weeding, the easier the work and more productive the garden
will be. But slacking off will produce more weeds, more work and less fruit (or
vegetables, flowers etc).
In the same way we must be diligent
in cultivating the soil of our souls, of keeping the ground soft and pliable to
receive the fertilizer and food of the Word of God, removing anything that is
undesirable (ungodly) which will harm our souls and getting rid of it entirely,
and keeping watch to prevent those things from taking root as best as we can.
We must examine our hearts regularly and thoroughly. We must seek His
righteousness, seek growth and godliness, and seek to avoid that which will
contaminate our garden.
This contamination comes from the
world in general. Of course sin is the first and worst weed. But there are
others more subtle, which are not sin in themselves, but can lead to damaging
consequences. I read this quote by Susanna Wesley which really puts it into
perspective,
“How
would you judge the lawfulness or unlawfulness of "pleasure?” Use
this rule: Whatever weakens your reason, impairs the tenderness of your
conscience, obscures your sight of God, takes from you your thirst for
spiritual things or increases the authority of your body over your mind, then
that thing to you is evil. By this test you may detect evil no matter how
subtly or how plausibly temptation may be presented to you.”
Contamination is not simply a list of
10 things the Bible says not to do. Sin even is not so cut and dried as that.
If lustful thoughts are the same as adultery, and continued anger the same as
murder, then we must watch our hearts, minds and motives as well as, and even
before, our actions. We need to keep ourselves from anything that will pull us
away from God, anything that makes us want the world more and Him less, no
matter how “good” that thing may be. We are called to holiness and that
requires being untainted by the world. It is so easy to let those little weedy
trailers sneak in to the corners of our gardens thinking they won’t get close
to the plants, that they will never cause any harm. They may even look pretty.
But they are destructive and must be dealt with severely.
1 Corinthians 6:12 New American Standard Bible (NASB)
All things are lawful for me, but not all
things are profitable. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be mastered
by anything.
We must be proactive about the weeds in our garden. They
will drain the life out of our fruit.
Vigilance
This requires double vigilance because weeds come from
somewhere. They don’t just appear out of thin air… Well, in a way they do, seeds
floating on the breeze, but they started somewhere. I live in the middle of a
forest which comes right up to our house. I do not have a garden or even a
yard. But I did plant some lilacs and raspberries not far from the house last
year. As I checked on them after the snow melted this year, everything looked
great. But as the year went on I noticed thistles, an abundance of thistles. I
also noticed that the thistles only grew where the ground had been disturbed
during logging the year before, but elsewhere the natural plants kept the
thistles out. It really was just this little patch by my house so I decided to
launch a campaign against them. They are not perennials so if I could keep them
from seeding this year my problem would be solved. And it was a few months of
war to prevent the prickly things from going to seed. Every time I thought I
had accomplished my goal I noticed one I had missed, or one that resisted the
weed killer or whacking I had given it. After I had thoroughly routed the issue
on our few acres, I thought my job was done. But then I noticed a few across
the road. Our neighbors had only a few of pesky things, but they had already
gone to seed. And the wind was blowing my direction. My efforts to eradicate
the thistles, though valiant and necessary, was not enough to keep them out
entirely. I had to battle the weeds coming from those around me as well as those
in my garden.
Matthew 16:11-12 New American Standard Bible (NASB)
“But beware of the leaven of
the Pharisees and Sadducees.” Then they understood that He did not
say to beware of the leaven of bread, but of the teaching of the Pharisees
and Sadducees.
It is the same in our hearts. Of course we have to take care
of our hearts and our sin and do what we can to remain holy. But if those
around us, who have any kind of influence on us, have weeds that they are not
dealing with, those weeds will try to seed in us. We have to be careful who we
are influenced by. That does not mean that we are only ever around the most
godly people we know, then we would have no one to witness to and encourage.
But we need to be careful of the influence we receive. Jim Rohn said “We are
the average of the five people we spend the most time around.” Don’t let
others’ weeds in.
The Alternative
Some may say that in that case it is better not to plant or
even cultivate at all. But our gardens do not start weed free. If anything they
start fruit free. We are born in sin. None of us has anything good to offer God
outside of God’s grace. Our gardens are full of weeds when we start, leaving
them weedy will prevent any godly fruit from growing or even being planted.
So cultivation is a must, but do we have to plant anything?
The answer is yes. I have seen many fields and yards that were worked up and
then left without seeding. After cultivation they were nice, neat looking
patches of dirt. Barren but tidy. Unfortunately, they didn’t stay that way
long. Soon they were full of weeds none of which were planted by the owner of
the field. Some tried tilling the ground again, to remove those weeds, but that
only caused the weeds to grow worse because it not only made the ground more
pliable for any plant to grow in, but also because instead of removing the
weeds it actually planted them. The weeds need to actually be physically
removed in order to be stopped. Something
will grow in the ground regardless of who plants it.
Matthew 12:43-45 New American Standard Bible (NASB)
Now when the unclean spirit goes out of a
man, it passes through waterless places seeking rest, and does not
find it. Then it says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came’;
and when it comes, it finds it unoccupied, swept, and put in
order. Then it goes and takes along with it seven other spirits more
wicked than itself, and they go in and live there; and the last state of
that man becomes worse than the first.
Summary
It is imperative that we cultivate our gardens, plant good
fruit in it, take care of the plants and remain vigilant against anything that
does not belong there. All of these are necessary for spiritual health and
growth.
What are you planting? How are you taking care of your
garden?
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