Lessons learned from a garden!

For so many years of my life, I have LOVED the first flowers of spring- daffodils, tulips, even dandelions bring me joy.  Their bright vibrant colors and entrance into a grey brown world give energy and promise of more sun to come!

Now dandelions have never been a problem.  My huge yard covers with them as soon as the weather allows.  But in all my years of living in this house, with a huge yard that I could fill to my content, I have never taken the time to plant any of the daffodil or tulip bulbs in the fall, so that I can enjoy their beauty!

Until now!  Last fall, I determinedly bought up a couple of different kinds of bulbs, threw them in the ground and hoped that I would see some color this spring.  (Yes, there is a reason that I have not done a lot of yard work.  I'm not very good at it.)  But sure enough, earlier than expected because of the beautiful early spring we have had, those bulbs sprang up in spots of daffodil yellow and tulip shades of yellow, orange & pink.

In the middle of my very unkept flower bed (pictures don't lie) I have found GREAT JOY! I look for time to go to the window, or step outside to breathe the fresh air and behold their beauty.  What a gift they have been to a winter weary heart!

At the same time that I have been enjoying this first...I have been experiencing another.  It's an inward growth that is laboring to 'spring forward'!  It's been hard and I'm finding myself waffling between wanting to 'give up' and desperate to make it work this time.  It's part spiritual, a lot emotional, with a smack of physical, and it is taking all of me to work my way through it.

But my trips to the flowerbed have been speaking to my internal growing place.  I'm learning some valuable lessons.
     1. These bulbs were made to produce one thing. They are either daffodils or tulips.  They don't try to be something they are not.
     2. Their colors and size vary and even change as they grow and enjoy the sun's warmth and drink the rain's sweet juice.  But they remain daffodils and tulips.
     3. They don't produce all year long. Just for a season!  They will always be daffodils or tulips, but they sometimes look like a plain old ordinary bulb.

Now to a proficient gardener, I'm sure I have much to learn about the beauty of a bulb.  But to me, much of the time, I don't even notice they are in my garden.  Yet when the spring comes, when it's the right time- they are the shining stars of the garden plot.  They give life and hope and joy to my heart!

Hmmm! So many questions come to mind.
Why do I try to do so many things? at once?
What is my one thing that I was designed to do better than anyone else in my world?
Why do I work to look like something different than I am?
Why do I keep on doing and doing, when my whole being craves to rest? to take in? to lie dormant?
Why do I think I have to shine all the time?

I'm sensing deep inside this bulb of mine that something is happening!  It's not my time to SHINE yet!  But the growth that is inside is beginning to push it's way up through the cold, hard, bare ground.

This season reminds me of another 'in the ground' time.  As Jesus appeared to be an 'ordinary human'- not able to save himself on that cross.  Yet he waited!  He allowed the death to come!  He stayed! He let the death be 'official'. I've learned that the Jewish belief was that the spirit hung around a dead body for three days hoping to rejoin with it.  But on the 3rd day it waited no more!

Jesus waited!  He stayed! No one could dispute he was dead! But then, when the time was right, life bloomed again. He was dead no more!  He rose up from the ground and He could be seen.  Not to everyone at once. Not with pomp and circumstance. But just to a couple, then a few more and then a few more! He was WHO He was supposed to be WHEN He supposed to be. HE brought LIFE to all because of it! Wow!

I feel like I've been in the ground- probably for 3 years just after Leisha died. I feel like the last few months, maybe more like the last 3 years, something has been stirring within me; something has begun the growing process.   I'm beginning to see a 'bit of green growth' pushing through the soil. It's not my turn to bloom yet!  But I want to be ready!  I will do the hard work!  I will wait and stay!  Lord, only you know who I truly am and what I am to be! Help me be patient! Help me be ready for my moment to shine as you made me too! Help me be part of helping others find your LIFE that you offer!

How about you?  What lessons are you learning from your garden?  What is growing in your flowerbed? Leave a comment to tell me what kind of bulb your are.  I'd love to hear!

Come on Sunshine! Hello rain! Let's get this garden growing! Easter is coming!

Reflections of a Good Friday!

I spent some time yesterday at my church, Crossroads, being led through a time of self-guided reflection through the stations of the cross- the last week of Christ's life. I must say that I was impacted deeply by those moments of pondering Christ's journey to the cross. I was struck by a number of things.

Have you ever considered the number of people that were in Christ's life that betrayed him in someway that last week? There was Judas, of course. That's who we often accuse of betrayal, because the scripture has written of his actions as a betrayal.

• But there were his 3 disciples that kept falling asleep- not sensing the importance of this moment in the garden. I know there are times we just don't understand the pain in a friend's face. But if Christ was sweating blood, you think they would get that he was hurting?




• And then there are the religious leaders. They were the ones that were working to set up the betrayal in the first place. Did they 'envy' Jesus? Did they resent his accomplishments, his following, especially after they worked so hard to 'do it right' all these years? Or maybe they really didn't like the fact that he was 'changing' how things were done. Change is hard- and messy! Religious leaders so often try to keep things neat! Everyone doing the 'right stuff' so that they can please...........who, God? I think not! We create these neat little boxes that our religious activity fits in so that we can please ourselves, or other people! I KNOW! I am ashamed to say, I have been one of those 'religious leaders." Would I have been, am I now- one of those who would have sought to betray Jesus?




• Then there was Peter! Ah, Peter! Zealous, determined, speak before you think Peter! He had spoken so eloquently not so long before that he would die before letting anything happen to Jesus. Yet here he sits in the courtyard, and this Man's man Peter is brought down by the simple statement of a lowly servant girl, "You were with Jesus of Gallilee." I had to question, what is it that brings me down from my commitment to serve the Lord? Where do I become more focused on the protecting myself than on staying faithful to this ONE who gave his life for me?




• And what about Pilate? Here was this man that could SEE that something was amiss in all of this. Scripture even says that Pilate was amazed by Jesus! AND he had the power to DO something about it? But Pilate was afraid! He was afraid of offending Tiberius. He was afraid of upsetting the people. He was afraid of the bitter chief priest. He was afraid of what it would mean for Pilate. Pilate let his FEAR dictate his actions. He condems a man he considered to be innocent to die- a cruel death.

What would have happened in this story if any one of them had responded differently? Would it have changed that fact that Jesus died on that cross for our sins? NOT! God provided this sinless lamb to be offered for the penalty for sin. I rejoice that Jesus was willing to take on the awful penalty, not just for my sins, but for yours too- and for the whole world.

But what would have been different in the lives of Peter- or Pilate- Judas, or any of the others, if they had chosen to truly do 'the right thing'? How would their journey have changed if they had not had THAT MOMENT in their memories?

Or even after making those choices, what is the difference in their responses to their failure.

In Pilate's case, it seems that one decision made out of fear, caused him to make another and another till he was paying soldiers to create a lie about Jesus in order to cover up the resurrection. You have to wonder what was really going on inside his head by now.

Judas was remorseful. He says, "I have sinned, for I have betrayed innocent blood." His heart grieved deeply with what he had done. He was so overcome that he couldn't see that even then, Jesus's act of dying was to offer forgiveness to him. He responded by taking his own life.

Peter, after denying Christ not once, but three times, weeps bitterly. And I don't recall hearing much of him for a while after that until after the resurrection. I have often wondered if Peter had been able to stay true at that moment if he might have been the one to help carry the cross for Christ later on. A friend helping a friend in a bitter moment. Instead it was some stranger- a passer-by, that was compelled to do it. I've also wondered how Peter was impacted by Judas' death. They had been in the journey together for 3 years. It had to be a slap in the gut.

Yet as I study the scripture passages, I get the sense that Peter retreated back into the 'family' of the disciples- and there he experienced healing and forgiveness.

I'm amazed at the Resurrection, when the angel is announcing to the women at the tomb that "Jesus in not here. He is risen! " The angel goes on to say, "Go, tell the disciples and Peter." AND PETER! This one who denied Jesus- tell him. Peter runs to the tomb to see what happened.

Peter is among the 11 as Jesus appears to them and issues the command, "Go into all the world and preach the good news." God used this same man, mightily, to proclaim the message of Christ's death and his resurrection. I can only imagine that it was that one terrible moment of failure that became the impetus to propel Peter to do the work of spreading this message with even more zeal- fully aware of it's power in his own life.

However, these stories of these people, their failures, and their responses to those failures are part of the story of redemption. They are here for us to read, and learn from. They are there to remind us- in our own moments of complete failure- that there is hope! HOPE that came from the life, death and resurrection of ONE who was without failure. HOPE that I so look forward to celebrating this Easter weekend!

How about you?

If you aren't sure where your hope comes from- I'd love to talk with you! I, like Peter, have found God's grace in the healing and forgiveness of my own story. I would love to point you to that source of hope- Jesus!

Here's to CELEBRATING his resurrection - and our hope- this Easter!