Figs!

I head out to the garden when the sun is just barely peeking over the treetops before it gets too hot. The humidity still brings sweat to my arms. I carry a bag but there is little to harvest. All but two of my tomato plants have succumbed to age and heat. The cucumber vines still bear small cucumbers and yellow blossoms, the promise of future fruit, but today, my garden seems as battered by the heat as I am.

I pick one cucumber and deadhead my basil. The garlic is not ready to uproot, and the oregano never took root. Despite my efforts to prune my raspberry, it still grows with a fervor that would be impressive if it weren’t inside my garden fence.

Then I arrive at my fig. It is now over six feet tall. I thought I had bought a “patio” fig tree, but now I wonder if I will need to transplant it. Maybe it and the raspberries. Or expand this area of the garden to wider than three feet.

And what are these growths on the stalk? Are these figs?

I read somewhere not to expect figs for three years. These growths are not ready-to-eat figs, but what promise they hold!

My friends who grow figs tell me that while fig trees thrive in most conditions, how much fruit they bear varies widely. One year they will have an abundance of fruit; the next year only a handful. And, in scientific parley, figs aren’t a fruit because they don’t come from a flower. Figs are the flower itself, inverted inward, containing little crunchies which are the fruit. Perhaps that is what makes them more nutritious than many fruits.

But geek-knowledge aside, these little blobs on their little stems mean my fig is moving in the right direction. And who among us doesn’t appreciate a little affirmation that we are moving in the right direction?

Therefore encourage one another and build each other, as indeed you are doing. 1 Thessalonians 5:11.

So, amid heat and lethargy and the lazy days of late summer, my fig tree proclaims the promise of good things to come. Maybe this year, maybe not, but sometime, God willing.

It’s tempting sometimes to become mired in the swamp of today’s dismal offerings. It’s hot. There is much that could be done, maybe even should be done, but there is nothing that must be done today. No one will care if I spend the day reading or binge-watching detective shows. What is the point of expending effort that undoubtably go unnoticed and unappreciated?

But those little baby figs tell me my efforts are not fruitless. Faithfulness in the little things like watering and weeding and tending my garden does not go unnoticed. Faithfulness in doing the laundry, cleaning the house, and preparing dinner is not unappreciated. Reading my Bible daily and spending time in prayer will bear fruit, maybe not today, but maybe sooner than expected.

So let us not grow weary in doing what is right, for we will reap at harvest time, if we do not give up. So then, whenever we have an opportunity, let us work for the good of all, and especially for those of the family of faith. Galatians 6:9-10.

Those little figs encourage me that I will have a harvest, but even if they weren’t there yet, I would have held out hope that they would show when the time was right. God is teaching me patience with these perennials. I’m to give them three years to bear fruit. Perhaps, as per Luke 13:6-9, even longer. Am I that patient with other people? Am I that patient with myself?

Back inside the coolness of my air-conditioned home, I push aside the urge to waste the day in worthless pursuits. There are little tasks to be done. There are responsibilities to uphold. Opportunities for faithfulness abound. There are figs on my tree. The promise of a harvest awaits.

Love in Christ, Betsy

Space to Grow

A friend of mine recently posted how her pumpkin and squash vines were taking over her garden.

Vines will do that. The first year my husband and I planted a garden, we put winter squash, summer squash, and cucumbers in a row with no dividers, no fence, and no trellises. They were everywhere. Twisting among themselves, growing across the yard, bearing fruit in the neighbor’s yard.

My friend says her vines have overpowered the rest of her garden, wrapped around the tomatoes, covered the herbs, choked the daintier flowers. Vines such as squash, cucumber, pumpkin, and zucchini grow horizontally, ever outward in search of new frontiers, boldly going where we would prefer that they not go.

Over the years I’ve learned to plant my vines far from the rest of my plant, surround them with fencing and give them something, anything, to climb on. None of this stops them from sending out tendrils into open spaces to explore beyond my boundaries, but it does slow them down and protect the rest of my garden.

At some point, their inquisitive and enthusiastic spirit will redirect its energies into producing fruit – cucumbers, squash, and pumpkins. If you give them enough space, this will happen before they overtake and overwhelm the rest of your garden.

Don’t you know people like that? At times, I am that person.

To my admittedly limited knowledge, no one has developed a less explorative vine, one that will color inside the lines and that knows its place.

As a gardener, it is my job to give these vines the space to explore without letting them infringe on my more sedate plants.

Like good stewards of the manifold grace of God, serve one another with whatever gift each of you have received… so that God may be glorified ion all things through Jesus Christ. 1 Peter 4:10-11.

Society today tends to value cooperation, collaboration, consensus, and cohorts. But some people need the opportunity to stretch and explore and seek new spaces. And just as my cucumbers are rarely stopped by my fencing, our efforts to constrain such free spirits rarely works. And maybe it shouldn’t. Maybe God made them that way for a reason, just as He made my cucumber vines.

We can encourage those plants to be more sensitive to the needs of those around them. We can give them space to explore where they are not infringing on others. Hopefully, we will encourage them to grow freely and with abandonment in the space provided while we provide a protected space that nurtures our plants with a quieter spirit.

There is room in my garden for diverse types of plants. There is room in God’s garden for every kind of plant. He created them all. He knows what is best for each one of them, and for each one of us. He is working to create the ideal environment for each of us to bear fruit for His kingdom.

There’s a good chance that my space won’t look the same as yours.

For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one, so it is with the body of Christ. But as it is, God arranged the members if the body, each one of them, as he chose. If all were a single member, where would the body be? The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” On the contrary, the members of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable. 1 Corinthians 12:12,14,17-18, 21-22.

Good news, my friend. Grow in peace.

Love in Christ, Betsy

Summer Harvest

Tomatoes! It feels like years since I have had a successful tomato garden. Oh, I have picked a few tomatoes and enjoyed them, but it’s been a while since I picked more than I could eat.

My daughter, Kat Bair, writes a blog as part of her job as a ministry consultant. She has written about me not giving up on having a garden just because I have had years of less-than-success with it. I’d never really thought about it that way.

Tomatoes will grow in my yard. I remember years of taking tomatoes with me everywhere I went to pass them along to others. My less-than-success has been due to learning how to do the things my husband used to do, trial and error, new methods, discovering the details that impact success. And the weather, which is beyond any of our control.

This year’s rain has really helped. The squirrels get their water elsewhere. The tomato and cucumber plants have ample water to refresh them on these hot days. Not the steady soaking showers of Spring, but the sudden claps of thunder and downpours brought on by heat and clouds.

If my soaker hose is analogous to reading the Bible and praying every day, these storms are like inspiration and direction from the Holy Spirit, sudden, unpredictable, powerful, restoring.

And the results are exhilarating. Tomatoes! Large Better Boys, Romas and Cherries, smaller Early Girls. Plenty for me and plenty to share!

The point is this: the one who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and the one who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. 2 Corinthians 9:6.

It would have been easy to give up gardening over the past years. At times, the only thing that kept me planting and tending and watering was my commitment to you, readers, to write about it.

So, thank you. Your encouragement, your readership, has filled my tomato tray with fruit once more.

You, and of course, God, who sends the rains and the makes the sun to shine and enables the plants to bear flowers and produce tomatoes and cucumbers.

This fruit won’t last. It is here and good for eating for a limited time. I could preserve it somehow, and if food were scarce, I would, but I prefer to share my excess.

I pick out my best tomatoes and cucumbers and bag them up for the people with whom I will share them. A single tomato for those living in retirement homes, more for those at home with children.

I share because that is why God gives us excess – to share with those who need it and don’t have it, whatever “it” may be.

And if we preserve, continue working, continue praying, continue to be open to the soaking of prayer and the sudden storms of the Spirit, God will produce an abundant harvest in each of our lives.

So let us not grow weary in doing what is right, for we will reap at harvest time, if we do not give up. Galatians 6:9.

So here, in the middle of summer, persevere. Rest, rehydrate, and carry on. A harvest awaits.

Love in Christ, Betsy

The Spider in my Shower

She’s been there for a week now. She was there the morning after the bug man came to spray the inside and outside of my home, putting up an invisible fence to keep the bugs out. It seems she found herself on the wrong side of the fence and couldn’t get back home.

She’s harmless, a grandaddy long legs. My daughter was bitten by a brown recluse once. Not harmless. But this spider doesn’t even build webs. When I shower, she moves out of the spray and waits for the heat to stop. She could climb back down the drain that I presume brought her to my shower, but she doesn’t.

Perhaps the bright white shower is better than the dark and dirty drain. There is water here. Except for my showers, the space is cool and predator free. Probably food free as well, which could shorten her visit.

I debate moving her outside, but my clumsy fingers would probably harm her if I didn’t cause her to have a heart attack in her weakened state. I don’t wish her harm. I keep my distance, and she keeps hers.

I sure some of you would have killed her by now. Who wants to shower with a spider?!

But she’d gotten me thinking about God and how evil people exist in the world when He could just get rid of them all. I’m content to co-exist with this spider because, unlike the brown recluse, she is not evil. Most likely, the brown recluse is not evil either but tell that to my daughter’s leg!

If I were to kill all spiders because some of them are dangerous, wouldn’t that be analogous to blowing up a workplace because your abusive ex worked there? Or to hating all (fill in the ethnicity) because you had an unpleasant experience with one of them?

And isn’t what we consider evil, at its core, just an exaggerated version of the emotions we all have?

But I say to you that if you are angry with a brother or sister, you will be liable to judgement; and you insult a brother or sister, you will be liable to the council; and if you say, ‘You fool,’ you will be liable to the hell of fire. Matthew 5:22.

So, if I am liable to the hell of fire, which Jesus says I am, God cannot wipe out evil without wiping me out as well. And I don’t think God wants to get rid of ALL spiders. He may not want to get rid of any of them, as difficult as that may be for me to grasp. He sees the world from a much different perspective than I do. He regularly lets evil befall those He loves. Even His own son.

Heavy thoughts for a spider to generate.

The house cleaners are coming tomorrow, and I doubt they will let the spider continue to coexist with me. The cleaning solution would probably do her in if they don’t just kill her. So, her presence in my life is only for a short spell.

I don’t know if she appreciates my tolerance of her. I don’t know if she knows most people see spiders as threats. I don’t know if she thinks of people as threats and is re-evaluating her opinions. I don’t know that spiders have opinions at all, but they do instinctively shy away from the giant beings called people. They do, like the brown recluse, act to protect themselves when they feel threatened, even if the contact is unintended. Maybe, in their minds, we are the evil ones.

The Lord is not slow about his promise, as some think of slowness, but is patient with you, not wanting any to perish, but all to come to repentance. 2 Peter 3:9.

I’m not sure how much longer this spider will live, but I will not kill her. The shower is big enough for both of us.

Love in Christ, Betsy

Summer Love

You may know it’s summer because the kids are out of school or the Fourth of July is mere days away, but I know it is summer when I have my first tomato sandwich.

Few things compare to the call of a red tomato dangling from its plant. It calls to something deep inside us – Take, eat. For the past few years, the squirrels have been taking and eating, sensing that same call. This year, it’s my turn.

I usually prefer my sandwiches on rye bread, probably Germanic genes expressing themselves, but not for a tomato sandwich. Only white bread will do, a soft and unassuming base to highlight the tang and tart and sweet of the tomato.

Later in the summer when the newness of having tomatoes wear off, I will add basil and fresh mozzarella to my sandwich, but I savor the first tomato sandwich without distractions.

I take a bit and let my taste buds absorb every drop of the tomato’s tang and its salty juices. The tender meat of the tomato fills my mouth and makes my eyes light up. Wow. That is good!

I have been looking forward to this sandwich since I put that little plant in the ground months ago. This sandwich is why I put that plant in the ground. Why I watered it and weeded it and fenced it and draped bird netting over it. All for this sensation.

My brothers and sister, whenever you face trials of any kind, consider it nothing but joy, because you know that the testing of your faith produces endurance; and let endurance have its full effect, so that you may be mature and complete, lacking in nothing. James 1:2-4.

At the risk of being sacrilegious, my friends, enduring the struggle of establishing a garden, tending it, and protecting it from predators has produced joy, this first tomato sandwich, lacking in nothing.

The garden isn’t a perfect metaphor for my walk of faith, but it’s a good one. Too often I focus on the grind of gardening, the daily attention it requires, the myriads of things that can go wrong, the nagging doubt that I am doing it wrong, the constant comparisons to other gardens.

But God calls us to tend our own garden. He promises it will be worth it. He encourages us to stick with it because the tomato sandwich it will generate is priceless.

In fact, the fruit that God promises to produce is so wonderful that any effort we may exert to encourage its growth will be washed away in the sheer joy of tasting the fruit. Every effort is worthwhile; nothing else compares.

Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls; on finding one pearl of great value, he went and sold all that he had and bought it. Mattthew 13:45.

This tomato sandwich will soon be gone, and I will want another. A self at peace, a content and restful spirit, an open and generous heart, the joy of loving another, these fruits are eternal. These fruits only God can produce in us.

This tomato, like all my tomatoes, is a summer love. Wonderful, exciting, fulfilling, and short-lived.

God wants to grow eternal fruit in me, fruit that I can share with a hungry world, fruit that enlivens our senses and delights our souls.

By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against such things. Galatians 5:22.

He wants to grow that fruit in you as well. It may take a little effort on your part, a commitment to continue when it feels difficult or pointless. But one day that tomato will ripen and you will get to savor His love, and Wow. That is good!

Love in Christ, Betsy