DAILY DEVOTION
To Till or not to Till
By
Kathy Schultz
Staff Writer
CBN.com
– Gardening had never been my passion. I had left the yard work to
my husband, but now I found myself in charge of the yard, as he had gone home
to be with the Lord. The quickest way to solve that problem was to do nothing
other than cut the grass. After all, we had lived here a while and the flowers
and shrubs were already planted. Spring came and the magazines began showing
beautiful yards. Flowers were on sale everywhere you went, even at the grocery
store, and they were beautiful. I remembered that my yard used to look a lot nicer.
I must be honest, the yard never ever looked like the pictures in the magazines.
Noticing that a few plants had died, and with a little prompting from my daughter,
I found myself eager to garden. I could just replace those plants and add some
new ones. This couldn't be too difficult. I could do this. Furthermore, a lot
of my friends gardened and enjoyed it. I purchased the flowers and got
out the shovel. This was going to be fun. Little did I know! The soil was hard
as concrete. No one told me that you needed to prepare the soil for planting and/or
keep it in good condition. These plants needed a hole. You could not just lay
them on top of the soil and expect them to survive. With a lot of effort, I finally
got one hole dug. My daughter and I decided to add the fertilizer, to water, and
to pray. Possibly these flowers would survive.
God didn't audibly speak, but in my spirit, I heard Him say,
"Child, you're like this ground. If you neglect Me, you too will
become hard." I thought about this. It wasn't like I did anything
to the ground. I had just neglected it. I hadn't thrown trash
in it. The problem was I had not done anything to it! I spoke
with a friend who is an avid gardener, and found out from him
that at least once a year the soil needs to be turned and the
fertilizer added.
Farmers know that after the harvest it is time to begin preparing
for the next one. They don't wait for planting time to till the
soil and add the fertilizer. We should do the same with our lives.
We need to spend time with the Lord, letting Him till our mind.
Praying, listening, and reading God's Word are part of the process.
When we come to a problem, we can't expect to see God's answer
if we've never spent time with the Lord. In fact, we probably
wouldn't even know to go to God if we weren't prepared to do so.
Preparation gives us the opportunity to help others.
Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks
you to give the reason for the hope that you have (I Peter
3:15).
Next year the garden will be prettier as I plan to spend the
fall preparing the soil for the spring. Maybe you, along with
me, can spend this day with God preparing for the future. There
are many Scriptures about the soil, but this one is a favorite.
May this be true in your life and may your life be full of God's
love and joy.
And I pray that Christ will be more and more at home in
your hearts as you trust in him. May your roots go down deep
into the soil of God's marvelous love. And may you have the
power to understand, as all God's people should, how wide, how
long, how high, and how deep his love really is. May you experience
the love of Christ, though it is so great you will never fully
understand it. Then you will be filled with the fullness of
life and power that comes from God (Ephesians 3:17-19 New
Living Translation).
PS: Some of my flowers made it. That was due to prayer and God's
grace. I know they would have done much better had I prepared
the soil. Thankfully, I can start now preparing for next year's
garden.
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