Tag: Gardening

The New Year

January arrives wet and cold. The ground sinks under my weight as I go out to the garden for the first time in weeks. Intrepid winter weeds dapple my brown yard with green.

Nothing is happening in my garden. It looks very much like it did after I planted the garlic in December. Only wetter. I should say that there is nothing happening that I can see. Because there is a lot happening where I can’t see it.

Underneath the cardboard, garlic cloves are fattening themselves on nutrients from the dirt and an abundance of water. Below the leafless branches of the fig and raspberry, their roots are growing thicker and stronger. They too are collecting and storing nutrients for the coming year.

Under my yard, hidden aquifers are replenishing their stores of water. Unfelt vibrations of the earth are pushing rocks and minerals to the surface. The ground is using this time of rest. The earth needs to lie fallow for periods of time, just as we do.

But I wonder if I do that, lie fallow and rest, well enough. Is just the winter enough of a sabbath for my garden? Is just an occasional “down day” enough for my spiritual life? I observe Sabbath during lent; should I do it year-round?

2 Chronicles 36:21 makes refence to the holy land making up for its lost sabbaths while the jews were in exile in Babylonia. As if God was imposing a stop in activity because his people would not take it willingly. A stop in agricultural activity and a stop in normal life. It echoes God’s promise in Leviticus.

Then the land shall enjoy its sabbath years as long as it lies desolate, while you are in the land of your enemies; then the land shall rest and enjoy its sabbath years. As long as it lies desolate, it shall have the rest it did not have on your sabbaths when you were living on it. Leviticus 26:34-35.

I am not going to make the leap that if we do not rest, God will make us rest, but there is some scientific support for the concept. Stress kills people. Inadequate sleep leads to poor decision making, unhealthy habits, and a weakened immune system. We need our rest.

The land needs its rest. Some say the pandemic was a forced sabbath for people and for the land. Almost five years later, I hope we taking regular small sabbaths, self- imposed rests for our mental and physical wellbeing. God made us and all creation to need rest.

Rest may look like nothing is happening, but we know that is not true. Rest allows us to absorb nutrients and strengthen our root system. Rest fattens the Spirit’s presence within us and prepares us for the coming year. Rest allows the rain that falls to fill our hidden reservoirs.

The rain has made my yard spongy and filled my creek. I love to see the water ripple over the rocks and swirl in the eddies. I love to think of how much life is carried in that water. Life for the dormant fish eggs lying among the rocks. Life for the resting trees lining the creek banks. Life for the growing plants who will benefit from the aquifers this creek fills.

On the last day of the festival, on the great day, while Jesus was standing there, he cried out “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, and let the one who believes in me drink. As the scripture has said, ‘Out of the believer’s heart shall flow rivers of living water’” John 7:37-38.

January arrives wet and cold. What a great time to rest and refill the river of living water in our hearts.

Love in Christ, Betsy

Joy of Discovery

The sun sits high in the clear October sky. The morning frost has burned away; the browning leaves release their grip and flutter to the ground. A perfect afternoon to work in the garden. I have an hour or two before the game starts.

My garlic bulbs arrived the other day. It’s too early to plant them, but it is time to prepare the space for them, to continue preparing the garden for winter.

As I pull up the weeds, the tangy scent of garlic confronts me. I pull up a green shoot hidden among the brown weeds, A tiny garlic bulb! I pull the weeds more carefully. Are these wild onions or very baby garlic? Suddenly this necessary task has become a treasure hunt. I have the sense that God has hidden these treasures for me, just for the joy it brings me to find them.

How true this is on a grander scale. We as people love to look for and discover things. And there is so much to discover! Look at the skies and all the celestial bodies. Consider the oceans and the vast landscapes and living creatures they contain. Concentrate on a patch of your yard and see the life, the ecosystem, the drama played out in miniature there.

It’s like God is playing peek-a-boo. Like He has hidden a gift for us to find.

The kingdom of God is like treasure hidden in a field, which someone found and hid, then in his joy he goes and sell all that he has and buys it. Matthew 13:44.

Scientists spend their lives looking for and finding extraordinary things. As I age, I often find myself resistant to new discoveries, new inventions, new anything. My brain is full. But what scientists are discovering is fascinating. It fills me with wonder and awe and a renewed respect for the brilliant creativity of our God.

Trees communicate with each other. They protect themselves, teach their young, honor some dead and ignore others. They coordinate efforts to erect defenses for their community.

Slime mold will seek out the best way through a maze to food, testing and abandoning dead ends. Scientists have used stimuli to “teach” slime new patterns of behavior which it has passed onto later generations.

Anyone who has ever had a pet knows that animals can be clever, manipulative, demanding, grateful, and loving. They scheme, they interact, and they grieve.

We have known for a long time that animals live in community with each other. Even “small-minded” animals like bees and ants have complicated social structures. Now it seems that plant life does as well.

For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts higher than your thoughts. Isaiah 55:8-9.

What an amazing world God created! And how wonderful that He imbued us with curiosity, an eagerness to seek and search and uncover. How perfect that He created us to rejoice in discovery; that He gave us such a complicated world to discover.

Is it true that the more we know, the more we realize we don’t know. Thousands of people study genes and diseases and plants and animals and stars and weather and oceans. On a grand scale and on a miniscule scale, our world is a fascinatingly complex place.

Even my backyard holds secrets yet to be discovered. Maybe my brain isn’t as full as I think it is. If a surprise garlic can fill me with joy, what else is there to discover?

For the lord is a great God, and a great king above all gods. In his hand are the depths of the earth; the heights of the mountains are his also. The sea is his, for he made it, and the dry land, which his hands have formed. O come, let us worship and bow down, let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker! Psalm 95:3-6.

Happy Hunting!

Love in Christ, Betsy

Effort and Opportunity

I look out my window and smile. What a difference a little bit of effort makes! For weeks the overgrown sugar snaps garden chided me. Every time I went to the garden I could feel the weight of an unfinished task, an unmet obligation.

The job was difficult. Overgrown weeds and dead plants entangled the fence posts and supports. The crabgrass was so entrenched that it took several passes with the tiller to clear the space. I tilled the space now, in the fall, so the microbes and beneficial bugs will return by spring. I covered it with cardboard so the weeds hopefully will not.

Now that space makes me proud. I made the effort and succeeded in clearing the space. Yay for me! I could not have done it without my brother-in-law’s help. I could not have done it without clear weather and the proper tools. But it is so encouraging that I was able to make the effort and complete the task.

Perhaps when I was younger and stronger and more energetic, I would not have been so gratified simply to have put forth the effort. Perhaps there were times in my life when I didn’t appreciate the obstacles many of us face in simply putting forth the effort.

There is a resistance that rears its ugly head and tells us not to try. There is a God who tells us to lean on Him for strength.

For nothing will be impossible with God. Luke 1:37.

I can do all things through him who strengthens me. Philippians 4:13.

Even if it’s little things like clearing the sugar snap garden, getting it ready for next year.

Now that space is ready for what is to come!

Now, when I look out my window or walk by my garden, I see that prepared garden space, and the inherent opportunity excites me. Now I want to prepare more of the garden. I want to prepare the space for the garlic. I know I can tackle the weeds along the fence line of the rest of the garden. I’ve done it for the sugar snaps.

No longer do I see the overgrown areas of my garden as exhausting and overwhelming obligations; I see them as exciting opportunities for future growth.

And if that is true in my garden, is it not also true in my life?

When I prove to myself that the small tasks God has given me are not too much for my feeble frame, I begin to look forward to the next tasks He sends me. He has sustained me. He has given me the strength and ability to accomplish this little thing, what else can He accomplish through me?

Suddenly, my world feels full of possibility. If God gives me a job to do, I can be confident that He will enable me to do it. If I am following Jesus, putting forth the effort to love my neighbors, love my enemies, put others needs ahead of my own, then God can and will use me to accomplish His ends. He will give me the strength and help and direction I need.

If God is for us, who is against us? He who did not withhold his own Son, but gave him up for all of us, will he not with him also give us everything we need?… No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. Romans 8:31-32, 37.

All this from a cleared garden space! Isn’t God amazing?

What overwhelming obligation do you face today? With God’s empowering Spirit, you can turn it into an exciting opportunity. I know. I’ve just done it. You can too.

Love in Christ, Betsy

Please join me as I sign my new book, Garden Devotions. Copies will be available to purchase at both events:

Sunday October 6th 9:30-10:30 am – First Presbyterian Church, Nashville or

Tuesday October 22nd 10-12 am – Logos Bookstore 2136 Bandywood Dr.

I love you anyway

I have taken my coffee cup out to the garden with me. I know I do not need to keep my hands free for garden work. There is nothing to pick. I’m letting the weeds grow. The garden is amazingly verdant for August. Recent rains, daily watering through the soaker hose, and cloudy days have encouraged the plants to stay green and growing. There are still new tomatoes growing but all the bigger ones have been taken.

As I sip my coffee and stare at the garden, a line from a children’s book rolls through my head.

“I love you anyway.”

My daughter had shown me the book. Olivia’s spirited and rambunctious approach to life has exhausted her mother. At bedtime she tells Oliva that her constant motion is a challenge, but she loves her anyway. Falling asleep, Olivia mutters “I love you anyway, too.”

 I love my tomato plants anyway. Even if they are riddled with weeds and devoid of fruit.

God has taught me this skill. He loves me anyway when I am riddled with weeds and devoid of fruit. God loves every one of us anyway.

I know this because Jesus loved people anyway. He loved the woman living out of wedlock (John 4), loved those caught in adultery (John 8), loved the ones the church would not accept – the crippled, the lepers and the unclean. He loved uneducated fishermen, agents of the government, the demon-possessed, and the sinners. He loved them all anyway.

And Jesus is the exact representation of God. (Hebrews 1:3)

For I have not spoken on my own, but the Father who sent me has himself given me a commandment about what to say and what to speak. And I know this commandment is eternal life. What I speak, therefore, I speak just as the Father has told me. John 12:49-50.

And what does Jesus say?

I do not judge anyone who hears my words and does not keep them, for I have come not to judge the world, but to save the world. John 14:47.

He loves us anyway.

Do I love Him anyway? Or do I only love Him because?

Do I love God when my body fails me, when my children are a challenge, when my job falls apart, when my husband dies? Do I love Him when the world seems full of evil and stupidity and selfishness? Do I love Him when I know He could change the situation to better meet my expectations, but He doesn’t? Do I love Him anyway, as He has first loved me?

Do I, as a member of the body of Christ in the world, love you anyway?

Do I love you even when you are obviously sinning? Is your sin any more a barrier to God’s love than my sin? It is not.

I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another. John 13:34-35.

I think I’ll take that up as my mantra for a while – I love you anyway.

I love my garden even when it fails to meet my expectations. I love my church even when it becomes divisive. I love my friends even when they hurt my feelings. I love my family even when we disagree. I love you when you live sinfully, reject the church, follow your own paths, demand your own way, even when you declare yourself less of a sinner than I am.

I love you anyway.

God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. John 3:16.

God loves us anyway. I close my weary eyes and whisper, “I love you anyway too.”

Love in Christ, Betsy

Faithfulness

Faithfulness dictates that I go out to the garden every morning, whether I feel like it or not. Faithfulness means I pull weeds even though it hurts my hands and wrists and shoulders. Faithfulness leads me to water the garden every day it doesn’t rain, even when I want to be doing something else. Faithfulness leads me daily to carefully rearrange growing branches so that they will be supported.

I do these activities because I have faith that they will lead to healthier, more productive plants. These are the daily little activities that constitute gardening. Sure, there are big activities like fencing and planting and managing the harvest, but these little, daily tasks are what ensure the garden thrives.

How like God to encourage and reward our daily little acts of faithfulness.

Life is full of daily little things that enhance our lives and keep us healthy. Brush your teeth; wash your hands; clean the dishes; wash your clothes. Often these daily little tasks exhaust us – not because they are difficult but because they are tedious and repetitive and endless. Their reward is rarely obvious. Our only motivation is what happens if we don’t do them.

My teeth rot: my family falls sick; roaches and mice infest my kitchen; I’m wearing stained and smelly clothes. The weeds overtake my plants; my cucumbers die from lack of water; the tomato branches break off under the weight of any fruit they grow.

There are consequences to a lack of faithfulness in the small things.

Am I reading God’s Word every day? Am I spending time in quiet prayer with Him? Am I thanking God for all the wonderful things He has gifted to us? Sunshine and rain and friends and family and homes and cars and electricity and food? Am I allowing His Spirit space to grow in me? Am I watering and supporting that growth?

His master said to him, “Well done, good and trustworthy slave; you have been trustworthy in a few things, I will put you in charge of many things, enter into the joy of your master.” Matthew 25:21.

Experience and science have long taught us that we adapt to our surroundings. Spouses tend to look like each other after a while; employees dress like their boss; animals evolve camouflaging colors and snouts and beaks for better dining. I wonder if we could adapt to better reflect Jesus if we spent more time with him. If I spent hours with Him every day, would I begin to talk like Him? React like Him? Love like He loves?

My daily treks to the garden, my constant exposure to growing plants, has taught me things that google can’t. Being in the garden every day turns my knowledge into a reality that I can touch and feel and smell. Knowing about gardening is not the same as gardening. Knowing about God is not the same as knowing God.

You have to DO it. Do the little tasks that faithfulness demands. Faithfulness can feel tedious. Faithfulness calls us to action when our emotions prefer inaction. Water the plants, pull the weeds, brush your teeth, wash the dishes, read the Bible, get on your knees. Being faithful in these little things brings us face to face with the world we envision – the fruitful garden, the healthy home, the presence of God’s Spirit.

And as we draw closer, as we spend time on faithful tasks, we begin to embody that vision and move closer to making it real.

And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another, for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit. 2 Corinthians 3:18.

Brush your teeth today, wash the dishes and thank God for all that He is doing for you. Be faithful and enter into His joy. Look to God, and seeing Him, be transformed into His image.

Betsy

God’s Gifts

The sun shines brightly over the tree line in the cloudless sky. A gentle breeze keeps the temperature pleasant. Water ripples in the creek but I cannot hear it above the buzz of the cicadas in the hedges. Only the chorus of birdsong rises louder than the constant hum.

I slip on my garden shoes and head to the garden. The clover that passes for grass in my yard is still damp from the overnight dew.

As I draw closer to the sugar snaps, I can see them dangling among the leaves. Short ones, tall ones, skinny ones, fat ones. Beautiful.

Pinching one off the vine, I pull the stringy fiber from their sides, use my fingertips to wipe off any dirt, and pop it in my mouth. Cool to my lips, their sweetness assaults my tongue. A quick crunch and my mouth fills with its nectar. Sweet and crisp and divine. A few satisfying crunches and I reach for another. Food from the gods, well, food from my God.

As I stand there and eat a few more, I am overwhelmed by the bounty. No need to grab the hose, no need to cut or train or pull or labor at all. Just stand here and let these gifts nourish me.

I wonder if this is how God intended the world to be. I wonder if this is how the world was before we mucked it up. Just delicious abundance at our fingertips.

Out of the ground the Lord God made to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food, the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Genesis 2:9.

One of the many evils of war is starvation, not just hunger, starvation. Something almost unheard of in peaceful, affluent America, where obesity, diabetes, and heart disease seem to be the problem.

What a gift it would be if I could transport these sugar snap plants, if they could grow where the bombs drop, and the bullets fly. If only they would grow in the decimated cities where people scramble and hide and starve.

For there shall be a sowing of peace; the vine shall yield its fruit, the ground shall give its produce, and the skies shall give their dew; and I will cause the remnant of this people to possess all these things. Zechariah 8:12.

After a few sugar snaps, I am satisfied. I pick the rest of the ripe ones before they get too big and sour and put them in my pocket. I can share them with my family and friends. They are not starving, but they may need a smile, a laugh, a hug, or an outstretched hand. My outstretched hand will offer sugar snaps, God’s gift to me which I will share with you.

You may not have sugar snaps growing in your yard, but God has given you a gift to share as well. You may have trouble finding a smile today. Some days are like that. But you can stretch out your hand to someone and offer what you do have – a listening ear, a quiet presence, a loving heart.

Take a moment today to revel in the sun shining in the sky, the breeze cooling the air, the birdsong overpowering the cicada buzz. God continues to gift us with such treasures, everything that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. Even when we muck it up, even while there is evil in the world, God continues to provide us with good and beautiful things.

Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. Philippians 4.8.

Betsy

Good News!

God did it! Sugar snaps have burst from their shell and are reaching for the sun!

Why did I doubt? Why was I worried?

God gifted those seeds with the impulse to grow. Even in their dried-out, lifeless state, inside they held the desire to become more. I just had to give them the chance, the opportunity.

I planted these seeds the first week of March. They have overcome the crabgrass roots, dried clippings, and the cardboard. They have grown without me tilling the soil. In this week before Easter, I praise God for bringing life when I doubted He could. How amazing is our God!

I was focused on what could go wrong and forgot what joy God gives us in His creation.

In there world you will have tribulation. But take heart: I have overcome the world. John 16:33 (ESV)

The sugar snaps overcome the crabgrass; Jesus overcame the pharisees, overcame the Romans, overcame sin, and overcame death.

It’s Holy Week. Jesus had entered Jerusalem to praise and adulation, but He knew what was coming. Violence, abuse, betrayal, abandonment, and death; emotional, physical, and spiritual torture. Followed by the greatest gift of grace and power and love ever bestowed on humanity. He suffers with us; He rises to re-write our lives.

Seeds sprouting and becoming plants is old news. It happens all the time. Nothing new here; move on.

But wait! A lifeless, old, dried out kernel was buried, and now it’s a living plant! What an amazing transformation, life-altering, life-giving, inspirational.

God does it. God does it all the time.

God transforms seeds. God transforms marriages. God transforms congregations. God transforms cities and nations. God transforms people. God transforms me and you.

And all if us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit. 2 Cointhians 3:18.

If you are looking at God and seeing His glory, He is transforming you into His likeness. God has put within you the desire to break out of your shell and reach for Him.

Sometimes, we may need to sit in the dirt for a while before He transforms us. God has created nature in such a way that seeds grow out of dirt; perhaps He created us in such a way as well.

Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain, but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. John 12:24-25.

This Holy Week, the seeds I planted lost their lives as seeds, and have become what they were intended to be, beautiful sugar snap plants.

I don’t want to stay a seed either. I want to grow and bear fruit. That may take some radical altering of my life. If God calls me to change the life I am now living, am I willing to give it up?

I will listen for His voice. He loves me. He loves me so much that He endured this week of unbelievable distress and suffering just to call me sister. He lost His earthly life for me, for you.

But to all who received him, who believed in his name. he gave the power to become children of God, who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God. John 1:12-13.

Good News!

God did it!

Happy Easter, Betsy