There's Wisdom in Gardening...

It's not something that I had ever considered, but a frequent trait referenced of pastors is a love of gardening - growing the summer vegetables, growing herbs, growing flowers & roses. I am beginning to understand why - there is wisdom in gardening.

WEEDING

Weeding is a great leadership/shepherding lesson. Weeds are pesky little, or sometimes not so little, things. Weeds suck the life-giving water from the ground so that the plants that ought to be producing fruit do not. They may look beautiful, but bear no fruit, or it may be killing them. This is sin in the life the church. There is an inverse relationship between sin and the church bearing fruit - the fruit of the Spirit, or deeds of righteousness. The more sin, the less fruit. How do you remedy the situation? Some weeds in a garden are out in the open. They can be easily removed by a hoe, a tiller, a backhoe, or if you are of the inclination, targeted and destroyed by a tomahawk missile. Others, however, are nestled right up next to the plants you are caring for. Those weeds must be removed by hand. You have to bend down, move the plant you are caring for aside, and gently remove the weed so as to not to damage the plant. As ministers shepherd the church there are obvious issues of sin stemming from depravity in our humanity and culture that should be immediately 'nuked.' There are other issues that should be approached with care in that they intimately involve people's lives and we do not wish to damage them in dealing with sin but to remove sin for their edification, growth, and ability to bear fruit. This can only be accomplished through a reliance on the Spirit, prayer, and wisdom in leadership.

INTENTIONALITY

I was picking squash tonight and moved one of the leaves on a plant the wrong direction. It snapped. I had never observed the stem of a squash plant. It is essentially a hollow tube. There is nothing in the middle. It is a tube topped by a broad leaf which is the vehicle by which energy is collected in order to produce the fruit on the plant below. The sole purpose of the stem of the leaf is to support the leaf and transport nutrients. Too often we ignore this principle in living and in organizations. We are a people that overwork, that overextend credit, that overcommit ourselves in more than one arena of life, and are therefore over-stressed and have lost sight of the one reason we are here - to live lives to the glory of God. Would that we streamlined our lives so that this was our one purpose, that we would give up things that do not match this goal, and that all that is left - whether by necessity or choice - were imbued and transformed by the one intention to glorify God in all things. In this we will rediscover not only our limitations, but our purpose.