Enthusiasm

I thought my cucumbers were enthusiastic plants, climbing their supports and stretching outside the fence, but they are mild in comparison to this raspberry plant!

In her second year, my raspberry plant has already birthed three new plants in the cracks in the cardboard covering. She is almost six feet tall. I sense I need to cut her back, hem her in, trim off the excess.

I have seen articles and studies on pruning, but I skim right past them. Tomato plants and cucumbers don’t require pruning. Although it’s possible they could be better if I did prune them…

Pruning is an important part of growing perennial plants, but I am new to perennials and have much to learn. Seeing this raspberry bush take over my garden and reach into the yard makes me want to learn. This can’t be best for the plant, best for the berry harvest, or best for me.

And yet, her growth is thrilling. Her enthusiasm for growth is contagious. I want to grow with enthusiasm and burst out all over the place!

My mother used to tamp down my enthusiasm on a regular basis, to the point where I felt like a wild pony trapped in a corral. But she understood. She had been a cheerleader in her youth; enthusiasm runs in my genes. Perhaps she was trying to prune me.

He removes every branch in me that bears no fruit. Every branch that bears fruit, he prunes to make it bear more fruit. John 15:2.

I am tempted to use this as my guide for how to prune. I am sure Jesus’ listeners at the time knew how to prune; they were grape and olive growers. They were being asked to apply their gardening knowledge to spiritual growth. Perhaps that is what the Holy Spirit would like me to do – learn how to prune this raspberry bush, when and how and to what extent, and apply that knowledge to my spiritual life.

Perhaps the goal should not be excessive growth that spreads out everywhere, but a contained healthy plant that produces much fruit. My smaller tomato plants are covered in green tomatoes, while this huge raspberry produces few berries.

And her uncontained growth is casting a shadow on my fig tree, growing straight and true beside her.

Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others. Philippians 2:3-4.

There’s a chance I, like my raspberry plant, have focused on the wrong thing – expansion verses fruit. There’s the possibility that my naturally enthusiastic self has spread beyond my boundaries and overshadowed another.

The raspberry bush cannot prune herself. It’s as if her enthusiastic nature can’t be contained. And I don’t want to stifle her; I just want her focused more on fruit than expansion. And that will allow my fig tree to flourish as well.

As for pruning my own enthusiasm, Jesus promises that the Holy Spirit will do this if we let him. He will prune us so that we will bear more fruit.

So, I will learn what I need to know about pruning and try to redirect my raspberry plant’s focus. Find the best way to encourage productive growth. Cut out the excess that her enthusiasm has rendered. I need to let the Holy Spirit do the same with me.

When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. John 16:13.

The first thing I need to do is learn. The main thing I need to do is listen. The Master Gardener, the creator of all gardens, the creator of all life, knows what I need to do.

Love in Christ, Betsy

First Tomatoes

I went out of town for a week and came home to red tomatoes! What a joy to see them there, peeking out from the green leaves. The squirrels didn’t steal them, the birds didn’t peck them, too much water didn’t split their sides. Ripe tomatoes!

The normal garden routine is to walk along the garden and watch the green tomatoes get bigger and bigger, then lighter and lighter, then see hints of pink and tints of orange arise. I put up the bird netting and seal off entry points for the squirrels and pray the tomatoes ripen before they are destroyed.

But sometimes the garden surprises me.

My little prodigy tomato plant brought me beautiful red cherry tomatoes while I wasn’t even looking.

Isn’t God amazing!

Should I be surprised they appeared the week of Pentecost, when God reminds us that He is the giver of gifts, the giver of power, and the source of all growth? God produced fruit on my tomato plant just as His Spirit produces fruit in our lives. Sometimes we work and struggle to help the fruit grow, and sometimes it suddenly appears like flames of fire or red tomatoes.

But there’s another reason these little tomatoes fill me with joy. For the past few years, my tomato plants have struggled. They may yet struggle this year, but these little red jewels fill me with hope and encouragement. Perhaps the effort I extend may actually result in the desired end – ripe tomatoes.

They are days when I love gardening for the activity itself – scooping up dirt in my hand and inhaling the soil’s scent. I sense a connection with the earth, the minerals in the dirt that are essential for life, the energy and life the soil brings. I sense the awakening of a long dormant part of my brain left by ancient ancestors who relied on the earth for daily survival.

Few things can compare to the scent of the basil and garlic plants, or the tart tang of tomato plant leaves. Sometimes just the joy of being outside makes gardening worthwhile. The bunnies and birds, the honeysuckle and fireflies, the tinkle of the creek and the swaying tree branches remind me of how good God is to us.

But I don’t garden for these sensations. I garden for the fruit. I want sugar snaps, cucumbers, peppers, and especially, I want tomatoes.

After walking in the creek for a while, I led my grandkids to the garden, and we picked those little red tomatoes. Two for each of them, which they ate walking beside the garden.

What a perfect gift.

Sometimes, I get tired of gardening and the effort it takes. Sometimes, the lack of visible results is discouraging. The same is true in my walk of faith. Sometimes, I get tired of extending the effort and discouraged by my lack of progress. Will reading my Bible today really make any difference? Do I really need to go to church today? I know I committed to this group, but they won’t miss me if I skip.

But then, God surprises me with a gift. Some word leaps off the page and I sense God speaking to my heart. I sit beside an old friend in the pew and reconnect. A woman in the group provides just the piece of information I need to finish my project. Ripe tomatoes on the vine.

His divine power has given us everything needed for life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. 2 Peter 1:3.

Put in the work. The tomatoes are worth it!

Love in Christ, Betsy

Six Years

The garden is thriving, green tomatoes grow on the branches, but I can barely see them through the cloudy mist in my eyes.

Six years. It’s been six years since cancer sent my husband to the Lord. You would think I would have “moved on.” Maybe I have. I don’t cry for him every day. I have found joy in writing, a purpose in learning. I have found ways to garden and lake and travel without him. But there are moments like today when the loss feels overwhelming.

We had so much fun together. Even when the cancer was eating away at his body, we would take long vacations at the beach and spend weekends on the lake. It’s harder to do those things alone; not the same when I do them with someone else. Nick had endless energy, and an intensity about living life, that I miss. Too often I am inclined to binge-watch some murder/detective/spy series and lose hours that could have been spent in better ways.

I wonder what he would think about my writing. It all came after his death. It would probably be as foreign to him as the hours I spent reading, a difficult task for his dyslexic mind. He was more interested in active pursuits, and he kept me busy.

But life, like my garden, is always changing. It does me no good to pine for what can never be again, at least not on this earth.

But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers and sisters, about those who have died, so that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have died. 1 Thessalonians 4:13-14.

Someday, we will be together again on a new earth where Christ rules.

I will let myself grieve the temporary loss of the man I love, but I will continue to embrace the life that God sends me every morning. These days, like all days, are a gift. I am sure God would like us to use this day loving each other, helping each other, serving each other as Jesus served those around him.

Perhaps God wants me to spend this day thanking him for sending me Nick and the years we had together. So, thank you, Lord, that Nick kept this garden going over the years. Thank you that he erected poles and fencing and buried a hose line. Thank you for being able to go to the beach and the lake and store up treasured memories.

I walk along the garden and let the humidity of the morning bead my arms with water. I marvel at the red raspberries and miniature peppers. I thank Nick for keeping the garden going over the years. I thank God for the rain and the sunshine, the soil, the seed, and the fruit.

Life goes on. The sun rises and sets and days, then months, then years pass. Six years since those days when the earth seemed not to move. Can I take an hour today to re-live them? The day the doctor told me Nick might not live for two hours. (He lived four more weeks.) The day Nick shut his laptop for the last time. The day he agreed to Hospice. The day he took his final breath. The friends and family who gathered around, who held me up, fed me, and sent me flowers.

How can I forget any of that?

What a gift love is. That I loved someone; that someone loved me. That God placed us in community so that we can share our struggles, our grief, our memories. That we can share our growth, our joys, and our hopes as well.

Thank you for being part of my community. Thank you for reading along. Thank you for your understanding as I take a break to grieve.

If you have a moment, check out my author website and information about my novel-in-the-works at Betsy Davies | Author. A lot can happen in six years.

Love in Christ, Betsy

The Simple Things

The air is dense with moisture and the wet grass soaks my garden shoes. It has rained every day since my return from the mountains of Peru. I take deep inhales of the thick air, grateful for the oxygen it brings me so easily, grateful for the level, flat walk across my backyard.

I worried about leaving my garden unattended while I traveled, but I needn’t have. God blessed Middle Tennessee with a cool, wet May, and my garden is thriving. The cucumbers are covered in bright yellow flowers, climbing their trellises and reaching beyond the fence. The tomato plants are tall and green with tiny green tomatoes promising a hearty harvest. I even picked a little red one from my prodigy plant!

The raspberry plant is almost too big, and I found my first red berry this morning! The fig has returned and is green and growing. Life is good in my garden. Only the oregano seems to be struggling. It’s my first season to grow it, so it may just be too early, too cool, or too wet. It’s early June; it has all summer to grow.

Being here in the garden, tucking cucumber vines back inside the fence, complimenting my tomatoes on their growth, reminds me of who I am at my core. I am not a world traveler who revels in new places and new adventures and new challenges. I am a simple girl, who loves to putter in her garden and walk by her creek and listen to the birds call to each other.

God is in the simple things, the scent of mowed grass, the little green tomato, the spreading vine. God is in the wet lawn and the heavy clouds and the thick green hedgerow. God blesses me with bunnies eating clover and ducks in the creek. God has blessed me with a home that feels like home, comfortable, safe, familiar.

Of course, God is in the big things, the marvelous things as well. The majestic mountains, the ingenuity of past people, the diversity of plants, animals, languages, and cultures, the crossing of mountains from dessert to valley to rainforest. Mostly, I am amazed that people without trains, buses, and cars were able to traverse inhospitable lands and build cities, villages, roads, bridges, and complex gardening and watering systems. The Incan Trail is a vast network of walking trails that cover Peru well beyond the tourist areas. None of it is as easy as walking to my garden.

I wonder if the Incan people knew that what they were building would be admired hundreds of years later by people from all over the world. Perhaps they were just tending their gardens, studying the seasons, and admiring God’s creations. Perhaps, like me, they were just living their lives.

I had the opportunity to meet a few of their descendants, speaking their own language, a derivative of the one the Incans spoke, tending to their herds on land that had been in their family forever. The shepherdess couldn’t understand why I wanted to see her and the alpacas. She was just doing what she did every day. Like having someone watch me walk among my garden plants.

Perhaps that is the beauty of God in the simple things. He created all of it and declared it all good. The heavens, the earth, the plants, the animals, and us. He created us to live in harmony and community with each other. He inspired us to cross mountains and build bridges. He encourages us to see His constant presence in the world around us as we go about living our daily life, no matter how mundane our lives may feel to us.

Whatever your task, put yourself into it, as done for the Lord and not for your masters, since you know that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward; you serve the Lord Christ. Colossians 3:23-24.

It’s good to be home, back in my garden, back with my friends. May you sense the presence of God in the simple tasks you face today and live your life to His glory.

Love in Christ, Betsy