We put the finishing touches on our vegetable garden today. Well, the “finishing” touches… at least for today. Somehow, I suspect there will be a lot more “touches” to come in the lifespan of this horticultural adventure! 🙂
Today, we built a fence around it — high enough to ward off the deer, with extra protection at the base to ward off the rabbits. Not to mention Skippy, who has already shown a keen interest in nonchalantly walking through (and stepping on) seedlings, sitting indiscriminantly on seedlings, and depositing (rather enthusiastically) her own personal brand of “fertilizer” wherever she pleases (even if it means digging up a seedling or two).
[Deep sigh.] 🙂
It’s funny. We are acting like brand new parents! Excited — OK, perhaps overly so — to watch these little seedlings sproud and grow. I am reminded of that old saying about a watched pot never boiling. If that carries over to this garden, we will never get any vegetables out of it! I mean, really… How much can those seedlings possibly grow in the span of two hours??? 🙂
Then it occurred to me. Isn’t that a little bit how You look at us, Abba? After all, we are Your children — “sprouting” up, growing up under Your watchful eyes.
Everything we have so carefully done with this veggie garden seems to mirror what You so carefully do with us… doesn’t it, Lord? Like choosing the place in our yard with the best and longest daily sunlight, and the particular veggies that will respond best to our region’s growing season and our yard’s clay-like soil. Not unlike how You choose who You will “plant” where — and when — so they (we) will have the best possible chance to blossom into LIFE.
“… and He marked out their appointed times in history, and the boundaries of their lands. God did this so that they would seek Him and perhaps reach out for Him and find Him, though He is not far from any one of us. For in Him we live and move and have our being.” (Acts 17:26b-28a)
Your customized tilling and preparing of the soil (in our families and our hearts)… Your fertilizing… Your planning and planting (for us and in us)… the sufficiency of Your Sonlight… the consistency of Your Living Water… Your heart for and hedge of protection (in the face of predators who seek to “gobble” us up, even when we are still seeds “in the ground”…). All this, and so much more…
Like the sheer JOY You must feel when we respond to Your loving care and sprout forth! When we push through whatever covers us — even when it’s manure. When we reach ever upward and, under Your expert pruning and shaping, produce a rich harvest for You!
We laugh at ourselves for running out to check on new growth every two hours. But You, Lord… You never take Your eyes off us, not even for a second!
“I lift up my eyes to the mountains — where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth. He will not let your foot slip — He who watches over you will not slumber… The Lord will keep you from all harm — He will watch over your life; the Lord will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore.” (Psalm 121:1-3,7-8)
Oh, Lord… I love this garden we now have in our yard. Every day, I can watch what happens — in it, to it, through it — and think of You.
“‘For I know the [plants] I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘[plants] to prosper you and not to harm you, [plants] to give you hope and a future.'” (Jeremiah 29:11, Furr’s Almanac Translation) 🙂
Grateful for Your green thumb,
Abba’s Girl