Growth

The sugar snaps are growing. The older ones are my height now, the younger ones are chest high. They are reaching out for anything to twirl their tendrils around, constantly pulling themselves upward. They are growing.

God fuels their growth with rain, and I provide water on dry days. They battle the weeds which have sprung up around them, trying to divert their upward growth. Some plants seem to struggle more than others.

I planted these seeds later than usual, so the garden is a few weeks behind my garden last year. The calendar date does not dictate when they blossom; the plants must reach a certain maturity before they produce fruit. My sugar snaps are still growing.

I could be frustrated that I don’t have fruit yet. It is May. But my frustration would not make these plants produce flowers. Seventy days of growth will bring fruit if they get plenty of water and overcome the weeds. Soon, but not today.

Be patient, therefore, beloved, until the coming of the Lord. The farmer waits for the precious crop from the earth… James 5:7.

Are you growing? Am I? Are we impatient to bear fruit when God knows we need this time to grow?

Some of you may be taller than me, further along in your maturity. Some of us may be battling invasive weeds which tie us down and hinder our growth. Some of us may be living in dry days; we may need the living water of communion with God before we can continue to grow.

The growing season can seem to last forever. Fear nibbles at the back of my brain, telling me things will never change, the plant will never flower, the fruit will never come. But that is not true.

Just as my toddler grand-twins will one day tie their shoelaces even though they can’t now, so my plants will one day bear sugar snaps, so we will one day bear the fruit God is growing in us.

The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how. The earth produces of itself, first the stalk, then the head. But when the grain is ripe, at once he goes in with his sickle, because the harvest has come. Mark 4:26-29.

God is the one growing fruit. As Jesus tells us in John 15, only God can produce His fruit in us; we cannot produce it on our own. We sprout and grow, and we do not even know how. It is not my job to worry about when His fruit will appear. It is my job to stay connected to the vine, stay hydrated with prayer, and overcome the weeds. And to watch for the fruit, to put it to good use once it appears.

I am proud of my growing sugar snaps. They look beautiful to me, reaching out, reaching up, growing taller every day. To think that the dried pods I put in the ground in March have matured into these plants amazes me. God has completely transformed them. Once lifeless, they are now on the cusp of bearing fruit. Isn’t God amazing?

Too often I am so focused on what has not yet happened that I fail to see all that God has already done. He has brought life where there appeared to be none. He does it every day, everywhere. He has brought growth even when we thought it impossible.

Today, I rejoice and give thanks for growth. Won’t you join me?

Let the heavens be glad and let he earth rejoice, and let them say among the nations, “The Lord is King!” Let the sea roar, and all that fills it; let the field exalt, and everything in it. I Chronicles 16:31-32.