I recently finished a book which used gardens as a powerful
analogy. As someone without a green-thumb, I struggle with anything that
involves plants, cultivation, or even recognizing the wild beauty of all things
growing – whether literal or symbolic. My house is currently plant less, unless
you count some of the scary stuff growing in the back of the refrigerator.
In spite of my inability to grow anything but three
lovely daughters, I have always been intrigued by those who have learned and
practice the art of gardening. Growing up in a rural area meant spending time amidst
other people's lovingly tended gardens, yards that looked like they could have been on the
cover of Better Homes & Gardens and vast farmer’s fields. I actually spent my first
year of marriage living in a house surrounded by alfalfa fields. The smell of
fresh cut alfalfa still brings back not only miserable allergies but also sweet
memories of being newly married.
The anonymous author of Ecclesiastes in the Old Testament
reminds us that for everything there is a season, a time for every activity
under heaven, including a time to plant and a time to harvest. In spite of the
cold weather and the winter season I find myself in, this concept of planting
and harvesting has been on my mind lately. I recently sat in a waiting room and
watched a woman reading a seed catalog the same way I read a captivating book –
dog earing pages, making notes and generally becoming absorbed in its pages. I
wish now I had asked her about her plans and plants.
As a child, I had Sunday
school teachers who used to remind me that you reap what you sow, you can’t
plant corn and expect to harvest tomatoes. It makes perfect sense and yet I
currently find myself harvesting things that I never intentionally planted. I
wish I could spin a beautiful garden-related analogy to help explain. But the
truth is that over a long period of time, I have planted seeds that in spite of
a lack of tending and years alternating between flood and drought, are now
coming to fruition. The fruit is bitter and poisonous, not sweet and
life-giving.
What does one do with a garden filled with bitterness and
poison?
Perhaps some of the time-honored approaches like weeding,
mulching and applying herbicides will find application in my life, for I’m
committed to making the soil amenable to beautiful and life sustaining
harvests. There is however a more urgent step that must be taken. I have
a responsibility to care for those who have unwittingly partaken of my
fruit. Unfortunately it isn’t as easy as finding an antidote or medication. They have vomited onto my heart. There has been a purging, but they will not quickly forget the
acrid and caustic taste in their mouths. I will care for them in the best ways I am able. I will plant and tend new seeds and then I will wait.
Waiting will be the hardest part.
