Growing Season

Isaiah 43:19 See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland."

Sometimes, things end.

A break up happens, a final moment, a graduation of sorts.

Sometimes, things get stale, people move away, energy fades. 

Sometimes, we’ve learned, we’ve mentored, we’ve shared, and we just know it’s the right time to venture out, gather around some new faces. Not that they need to learn from me, but more, so new experiences and learning/growing begins to excite the soul once more. A new pathway can lead to new insights. 

Its spring! Let's look at some of our potted plants. Are you finding overcrowding, bursting- at- the -seams geraniums? They divide easily. It just takes a small section to break off, re-root and in no time, you’ve got a new plant.

An old Aloe Vera shoots off new arms every year and I frequently break off a cluster to start in a pot for someone. They come in handy for sunburns. 

A piece of ground that held my beautiful impatients, sits restless, after the frost got to them this year. The dirt longs for some new color and I hope to fill the space up soon. 

Enumerable buds are about to burst on my roses and the Amaryllis are just about to open. 

Wouldn’t it be sad if they just stayed in their bud form, never getting the chance to open up and absorb the sunshine and show off their beauty. After all, that is their purpose.

People are like that sometimes. They stay in their safe little bud, afraid to branch out, open up to what lies in their God-created cells, afraid what Holiness, Christ-likeness means, what it changes. 

What if they were meant to be a prize rose? What if they were meant to adorn a bouquet for a wedding and then preserved in a memory book? What if they were gathered to bridge a friendship in an act of forgiveness, bring joy to an ill or grieving person, or even "soothe a sunburn"?

And what if their only purpose was for the joy of the moment, and they bloomed to their full potential in their season? 

The "sometimes" do happen, and the "what-ifs" do too.

This week after listening to God, I know what the “sometimes” are, and He inspired me about the “what-ifs.”

With that thought in mind, I am gathering my spade, my planting mix, a few selected pots and with the Creator’s skill and green thumb, hope to begin a new “potted garden” of joyful, beautiful petals, willing to sink their roots in the warm soil of His grace. 

Lord, OK, I am stepping out in obedience here. I’m listening and trusting, cultivating faith in Your plan. Keep my “pots” ready and willing to be filled with your good nurturing and I look forward to replanted and bursting buds multiplying out JOY in the garden of our hearts, Amen.