Bones of the Garden

 







     

   

            It's winter out there.  Not much gardening going on.  They say that you can tell a lot about your garden in the winter.  The bones of your garden are exposed, the structure, the foundation, the design plan that everything hinges on.  When spring and summer come, all is glorious color and texture, filling the beds with beauties of multi-colored flowers, spilling over the edges of paths.  You don't see the bones in the summer when all things are colorful and gorgeous.  The time to see what a garden is really made of is in the winter.  It is then you can make changes and redesign bits of your garden.

           You can tell a lot about the bones of your spiritual life, also, in the wintertime.  When trials come or when days are dreary and mundane or dark, the foundation that has been laid really shows up.  It is easy to follow Jesus and be excited in the summer when all things are well and beautiful.  The real truth of your life in Jesus is revealed, though, in the winter.
   
           Foundational plants, like boxwood, small trees, grasses, or evergreens and arbors give framework for all the other plants to show their beauty throughout the seasons.  Otherwise, your garden has no order and can easily just become a mixup of multicolored plants.  It is the same in our spiritual life in Jesus.  My foundation, my spiritual bones, must be fed and nourished in Jesus through reading His Word and praying and talking to Him.  When the bones of these basic structures are built into my life, my spiritual garden has strength which will keep me through the dark winters of life.  There are seasons in spiritual life as well as in the garden.  When days are dark, stick on the basics.  God will build your soul strong and give your bones needed nourishment.  Spring will come eventually, and then He will send blossoms of beauty springing up.                                      K.C.

Who is the real helper?

                                                 

          Gardening is a never ending task that requires  lots of labor!  Always there is something to trim, cut back, burn, plant, deadhead, weed, spray, admire, train, coax and encourage.  Without helpers around here it just wouldn't happen.  Too many acres, too many weeds, too many tasks.  Without my faithful husband I simply couldn't be a gardner with this size of land.  Now our grandchildren are getting into the scene.  Reed wanted to "help" pull branches across the yard and throw them into the burn pile.  Papa graciously and slowly coached Reed in the process.  What a precious sight that melted my heart, to see Papa followed by 2 year old Reed "helping"!

          We have been studying Hebrews 11, the faith chapter in the Bible.  So often we focus on the characters in chapter 11 and their great faith.  Instead, I am suggesting that we need to focus on our Heavenly Father's gift of faith that He gives us.  We think we are "helping" God in His earthly tasks of harvest when in reality it is all about Jesus' help in our lives!  We receive grace and mercy to accept the gift of faith by believing in His work on the cross.  We receive His Holy Spirit, we receive strength, we receive gifts that enable us to serve and help.  So who is "helping" who?  

          God our Father desires our companionship, our presence, our worship.  He is so compassionate and patient toward us that He allows us to think we are "helping" Him by our service.  Papa allowed Reed the space to think he was a huge help, and that is what God does for us also.  He gives us faith, He gives us all we need to be on His team.  We so enjoyed being together with Reed and "working" together.  What a joy, what a privilege!  It melts my heart to think that God desires my companionship in such a way as this, and that He wants me on His team of helpers. Truly, Holy Spirit is our helper and will never leave us.  Now that is joy!

M & M's

                                                       

          Thinking through another new year, I asked the Lord Jesus what thoughts He had for me.  No big revelation has come to my heart.  But He has quietly spoken.  He said to guard my minutes.  Mind my minutes.  Multiply my moments.  Measure my mission.  This is largely a devotional page for thoughts from the garden, thus, the M & Ms sitting on the garden post.

          We can waste a lot of minutes each day, and those minutes are what God is addressing in my heart.  I don't know about you, but I can wile away a morning watching the garden grow.  God wants me to measure my mission, my task He has called me to.    Now I am not talking about staying busy or accomplishing more.  I am talking about minding how intentional my minutes are.  Spending minutes in awe at God's work in the garden or His marvelous creative design in birds are not wasted  minutes. It is more like He is saying to be ALL there every minute.  There is a difference between letting minutes tick away and deliberately living those minutes.  When I am consciously minding my minutes life takes on a thoroughly alive sense.  It is like intentionally living!  And that is what God is saying to me;  intentionally live for Me.                                                                                   K.C.

Hold Fast

          Hold fast!  Like the ivy holding fast to the post.  Without the post it surely wouldn't be climbing upward.  Takes a bit of patience to train ivy to go up the post, but with consistent
perseverance it takes off upward.  Sometimes a wayward tendril seeks its own path, but
eventually it either makes its way around the post or it falls downward.

          The book of Hebrews talks about holding fast the confidence and rejoicing of our hope
in Christ Jesus.  The hold Jesus has on us is powerful and life changing.  Nothing can snatch
us from His hand, nothing can separate us from His love.  John 10:28-29, Romans 8:39.  Scripture also teaches that we  hold on to Jesus through faith in Him.   I Corinthians 15:2, "hold fast that Word..."

          There are 2 holds in Psalm 63:8.  "My soul clings to you; Your right hand upholds me."  I am thinking that too often we focus on our part; I have to hold fast, I have to work, I have to press on, I have to climb that post.  Actually, the direction, the strength, motivation, the power comes from the post - the cross of Christ.  It comes through His working grace in us, showing us His goodness and glory, His sacrifice and offering to make us right with the Father.

          Jesus does so much for us through His grace that it makes our soul desire to cling to Him.  It isn't a duty, but a wonderful freeing rest and joy to cling to Him.  Jesus Christ not only saves us from our dark sin-heavy soul, but He gives our lives purpose and direction, meaning and hope.  What a joy it is to cling to the cross of Christ!  Have you ever seen ivy without a direction?  It just becomes a wandering vine that is a nuisance, taking root here and there, messing up the garden.  But give it a post or structure to grow on, and it becomes a majestic work of art in the garden!

          So hold fast the Post, hold fast to the Word, hold fast to the rejoicing of hope in Christ.
                                                                                                                                                       K.C.

Feeding Time

       
                                                                     

  

          Feeding birds off our patio has been enjoyable for many years now.  We get quite the variety appearing to eat their fill each day.  They have been learning when and where to eat, and I do even believe they tell their feathered friends to come on over.  Here we have an Evening Grosbeak, a Steller's Jay, and a California Quail - all beautiful creations of our Lord who is the Master of design.  It is the idea, though, of learning where to eat that I focus on here.  Spiritually speaking, where do you eat?  Where do you feed?  Who do you listen to?  What do you read?

          Have you noticed that there is today a gigantic amount of books floating around?  Do you wade through the shelves or the website and then quit because there are just too many to pick from?  How do we even pick a book to read with so many choices?  It is a difficult thing to do.  The one thing we can know is that reading our Bible is the best and first book to read and absorb.  But after that, what or who is going to mentor you?  That is really what to think about.  You become like who you spend time with, whether movies, books, media, or people.    My challenge today for you is to ask God what He wants you to be like, to become.  What has He designed you to be?  The decision on what to read follows thinking about what you want to become, and that cuts down a lot of book choices.  And, if your life is like mine, you do not have an overabundance of time to read in the first place.  There again, that cuts down a lot of book choices.  We want to use time wisely and invest it so that we get good returns for our choices.  We want to become that person of character that fulfills God's design for us.  This makes picking books or speakers much easier for us.  We then eat what God wants us to eat and become what He wants us to become.   Where we eat matters.                       K.C.                                                                                                                                                          

       

Logging Together

          Afternoon at the pond logging together - Brenda (missionary friend) and I were walking through the park and came upon this scene.  I thought this was so cute and so reminded me of us as people.  Looks like quite a session of chatting, comparing notes, pushing each other around.  And one of these critters is even at rest!  It is a firm bet that all these on the log do not always see eye to eye.

          Studying Hebrews 10:24 - 25 this week has reminded me of this picture taken in the fall when it was still beautiful and sunny.  "Let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching."  Definitions of words create visual pictures that go beyond the mere words.  Here's the meaning of the verse using word definitions.    Unless we are together there is no way to provoke, agitate, stir up each other to agape love - love that is not self-seeking, but whose pattern is the Cross of Christ.  That is the kind of love we are to help each other attain, and it cannot be done unless we are in community activity.  This is not a leader led activity but is supposed to be what we do together all the time.  Interesting that when we are together friction happens occasionally with different opinions, focuses, and giftings.  So we as people tend to withdraw or leave, but when we do we are missing the very thing God intends to accomplish!
God means to create a Body of believers with one heart.   He does this with totally different kinds of people that center their lives, activities, and interests on making Jesus King.

          This week have you "considered" how to log together?                                                     K.C.

Glory Shed

               





 

          Our little Ginko tree down the driveway has shed its glory.  It was so vibrant, almost fluorescent.  The leaves are now puddled beneath shining with residual light.   Now the tree is just a little skeleton, waiting for the fresh sap to run through it next spring.

          Reminds me that I am just the frame on which Jesus Christ can bless and rest a bit of His glory.  And that is a freeing thing!  I am to just abide, trust, and stand waiting for the next working of God in my life.  He will take care of the growth and the glory in His time.  The glory He sheds on me is just to bring attention to Himself anyway and remind others of who He is and what He has done for them through the cross. Where we mess up is when we want to retain some of that glory for ourselves.  That makes a lot of work and stress in life.  But to just be available as the frame for Jesus is restful.  Being a follower of Jesus and watching what He does in people's lives is amazing!  His Words are alive and bring life, even to the deadest looking tree.  The branches aren't the life.  It is the life-giving Sap that flows through them.  It is the same with us.  We don't bring life to ourself, it is Jesus' Spirit who brings life.  And oh, is that not freedom!                                                                         K.C.