Make a Garden

Yesterday I mentioned that if you plant a garden you need to be feeding the soil. You have got to replenish the nutrients that the plants consume if you want to have a fruitful harvest year after year. In comparison, it's like having a mentor for the Christian walk, someone who pours into you, and calls you to be more like Christ. We need a Paul in our lives. But there is a flip side to this. We actually need to plant the garden; otherwise we have a bunch of wasted space.

It's amazing what people will spend on their lawns. There is a fertilizing program consisting of four steps to be done throughout the year. Each bag costs between $45-$60, and only covers 15,000 square feet (about 1/3 of an acre). People spend hundreds of dollars each year on their grass. Grass really doesn't do all that much. Yes it helps hold the soil in place to prevent erosion, but it doesn't give you anything. It simply takes the nutrients you supply and gives you nothing in return for the work you do, except causing you to have to do more work by mowing it.

A lady I work with said a couple of weeks ago, "Your lawn is a desert." Set aside the requirement of rainfall and she makes a good point. Your lawn doesn't do anything. It doesn't produce food, it doesn't even produce a flower (dandelions and clover are weeds that step two of the four step program works to eliminate). You end up with a bunch of wasted space. And so the solution, make a garden. Let the money and nutrients you're pouring into the soil work for you. Let them work to produce something of benefit.

This, too, has a parallel to our lives. Just as we need a Paul to pour into us so we can produce, we also need a Timothy to pour into. If we constantly give without receiving eventually we have nothing left to give. And if we constantly take without pouring anything out we become a hoarder with wasted resources. We suck nutrients that could be used to feed something productive.

I've had the chance to float in the Dead Sea twice now. The second time was cool, but not as mind blowing as the first since I had an idea of what to expect. This amazing landmark and phenomenon occurs because of the geography of the location. The Dead Sea is nearly 1,400 feet below Sea Level, as the lowest place on earth that isn't in the ocean it is a location that everything flows into, but nothing flows out of. The minerals there are deposited and caked on the Sea floor and the beach. The fresh water that flows in from the Jordan River is immediately contaminated by the high salt content. Nothing can live in it, and if you were to drink any of the water accidently you would need to have your stomach pumped. And that is what our lives look like if we have no one we are investing in.

Is your yard full of grass? Why not turn part of it into a garden? It will be good exercise, save you money, and be a fun project for you and your family. The soil will be able to produce something useful and valuable. Do you have a Timothy? Are you investing in someone else, pouring into them, and helping them become more like Christ? Find someone, pray for God to send someone to you, open your eyes to who He has already placed in your life. Begin to encourage and teach about what God has done in your life.

Get a Paul, find a Timothy. Plant a garden and fertilize it.

"I have been young and now I am old, yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken or his descendants begging bread."

To God alone be the Glory!

Peace be with you