Whether you have a green thumb or brown thumb, chances are you have been met with a plant that did not survive. Maybe a little tiny bug bit a leaf and you allowed that, only to see that he next devoured the entire plant. Or possibly a pretty vine grew up right next to your flowers and you allowed that, only to see your flower get choked and die. Maybe as simple as an animal rummaging through your beds disrupting germination…. or a chicken eating the carrot sprouts… quite possibly even, a child digging up your hard work. So what did you do next? Similarly, Biblical gardens are complex and involve work.
Every year I intended to start a garden, I loved seeing the flourishing plants and the satisfaction gardeners had producing their own food. One year, I planned my area, decided what I wanted to plant, got busy, and that was as far as I got. The next year, I found those same plans and bought the seeds; those seeds never saw the light of day as I never found time to plant them. Sigh. The following year I started small, picked a couple beds and planted(!) seeds, only for them to get destroyed by pets, animals, and children. After that a year of deep trials prevented me from wanting to try. It was the year after that where I actually started gardening and seeing the fruits of my labor.
Biblical gardens are similar. They are a lot of work, you have to find the time to do the work, and you need to keep going out there continuously, even if you’ve been met with mistakes and failures in the past.
Don’t forget to download your copy of our Family Bible Plan. Sign up for our email list to walk through the Bible with us! It’s never too late to start….
The Garden of the Promised Land…
‘[A]nd that you may live long in the land that the Lord swore to your fathers to give to them and to their offspring, a land flowing with milk and honey. For the land that you are entering to take possession of it is not like the land of Egypt, from which you have come, where you sowed your seed and irrigated it, like a garden of vegetables. But the land that you are going over to possess is a land of hills and valleys, which drinks water by the rain from heaven, a land that the Lord your God cares for. The eyes of the Lord your God are always upon it, from the beginning of the year to the end of the year.
And if you will indeed obey my commandments that I command you today, to love the Lord your God, and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul, he will give the rain for your land in its season, the early rain and the later rain, that you may gather in your grain and your wine and your oil. And he will give grass in your fields for your livestock, and you shall eat and be full.’
Deuteronomy 11:9-15
God gifted them land that produced. My husband has installed irrigation systems many times, one purpose is to distribute water to the areas that need it on a continual basis. We live in a location that definitively has 4 seasons coupled with a lot of rain. Yet, a drip system on garden beds would make my day for those sunny days!
I think it’s easy to forget that God didn’t just offer the Israelites a place to live, He gifted them a prime location filled with abundant blessings. The land by itself (with God sending rain) was fruitful. Ask a gardener in the desert how important watering your plants are… welcome to their gardens in Egypt. Then ask someone who needs a greenhouse to grow anything because they live in a mountainous region how important the sun and temperature and water are. The area itself, the Promised Land, was a gift, it was a garden.
In Genesis, Adam and Eve were blessed with a garden as well. They disobeyed and ate from the one tree they weren’t supposed to. Contrast that to the Israelites, where they are now gifted a garden to live in except their one “tree” is that they are to revere the place of worship and not desecrate it.
Weeding the Garden…
Typically, you need to work hard to have a successful garden. I remember one of my early gardening years as I was picking weeds I had my phone next to me, googling images of leaves because I couldn’t tell which one was the plant and which one was the weed. I just knew there were bad ones in there and they needed to come out.
It was hard to tell what was from seed and what was trying to weasel their way in to easy water and care. It was interesting to see how often the weeds would grow right up next to my plants though. As though trying to make it so pulling them out would rip out the intertwined root system of my plant.
For some starts, I simply had to wait until they got bigger before I could identify which was a weed and which was my plant. Google failed me and I had no idea. Those weeds usually grew fast(!) and then overshadowed my plants, leaving them lacking in sunlight and taking away the rain drops meant to nourish.
If your brother, the son of your mother, or your son or your daughter or the wife you embrace or your friend who is as your own soul entices you secretly, saying, ‘Let us go and serve other gods,’ which neither you nor your fathers have known, some of the gods of the peoples who are around you, whether near you or far off from you, from the one end of the earth to the other, you shall not yield to him or listen to him, nor shall your eye pity him, nor shall you spare him, nor shall you conceal him.
Deuteronomy 13:6-8
Weeding in the Bible is talked about in the life of the church and in our personal lives often. It is incredibly uncomfortable to think about weeding people out of our lives. When we go through the Old Testament, it is shocking how many times and how strong of a stance God takes on weeding out those who worship other gods, encourage someone to stray, sin blatantly, etc. He cares deeply about preserving holiness.
You shall surely destroy all the places where the nations whom you shall dispossess served their gods, on the high mountains and on the hills and under every green tree. You shall tear down their altars and dash in pieces their pillars and burn their Asherim with fire. You shall chop down the carved images of their gods and destroy their name out of that place. You shall not worship the Lord your God in that way. But you shall seek the place that the Lord your God will choose out of all your tribes to put his name and make his habitation there. There you shall go, and there you shall bring your burnt offerings and your sacrifices, your tithes and the contribution that you present, your vow offerings, your freewill offerings, and the firstborn of your herd and of your flock. And there you shall eat before the Lord your God, and you shall rejoice, you and your households, in all that you undertake, in which the Lord your God has blessed you.
Deuteronomy 12:2-7
God wanted the Israelites to cleanse their location of everything that represented false gods. It was important to God for the Israelites to wholly preserve His holiness, no different for us today with our own Biblical gardens.
This should all trickle down similarly to us as we consider who is in our lives influencing us, or what gods we are allowing to establish next to our roots. Obviously I’m not saying cut off everyone you know, but be cautious about who does call themself a Christian but does not truly serve the Lord in action, word, and deed. Saying you love Jesus is vastly different than loving and obeying Jesus. That is likely their own defined version of Jesus and not the Jesus of the Bible. That is scary. Scary, also, is how many sins, weeds, we allow to grow in our heart. As God refines you, He will start uprooting them and your eyes will focus more on Him.
Water your garden…
Water is a necessity for any garden. In fact, we have successfully grown plants in just a water garden (aquaponics and hydroponics). Plants will not grow without it. So what happens if you live in an area like Egypt with very little rainfall? You need to irrigate, get a drip system, or stand outside with a hose and water the plants yourself. Sounds easy enough. Except that irrigation sometimes gets a leak and the plants don’t get the water. Your drip system might have a kink in the hose and not work properly. You may forget to run outside with a hose every night or just be too plain tired to bother watering.
The Israelites were told that God would provide the water they needed. He was gifting them with life-giving water to sustain their bodies. In the New Testament, we see the correlation to this point in how God now gifts us life-giving ‘water’ through His son, Jesus Christ.
Our Biblical gardens need that life-giving water as well. They need life-giving sustenance to grow. We need to feed ourselves with the same. Prayer, devotions, etc. LIVE in the Bible. If we don’t, we will wither away. The life we have is not a guarantee of ease to coast into Heaven. It is a battleground. We fight the weeds so our roots are strong, we crave the water and drink of it daily so as to grow up strong in Christ that others may see Him by our fruit. We need to daily water Biblical gardens so they will replenish and grow. Now THAT is never out of season.
Ultimate Gardener…
We see picture stories, parables, and visuals all the time in the Bible. While we may be a literal gardener on this earth, consider that God is the ultimate gardener of us. True Biblical gardens are our very lives. We need to allow God:
- to develop deep roots in us,
- weed around us,
- see who He plants next to us,
- drink His living water daily, and
- develop fruit.
For you are to cross over the Jordan to go in to take possession of the land that the Lord your God is giving you. And when you possess it and live in it, you shall be careful to do all the statutes and the rules that I am setting before you today.
Deuteronomy 11:31-32
Just as the Israelites were to be so careful about what they allowed in their garden (the Promised Land), we need to be just as cautious about what we allow in our lives (our garden). We either accept His life-giving water or we ‘nourish’ ourselves with other options. We either allow Him to weed out those among us, or we tempt fate putting our own salvation at stake. A little leaven ruins the whole loaf… a little poison in a glass of water can kill you… a ‘little’ love of money can rule your heart. A little bit of anything can destroy you… be careful what you allow in.
We may experience seasons as we watch a weed attack our roots, take our sun and water, or bully over us. The battle to develop and grow in our faith will likely be wrought with hardships. But it is through those hardships that God refines us to become strong. Our eyes look to Him when He shines His son upon us and we seek Him. There your growth will flourish because your roots are established.
Are you allowing God to be the gardener of your life?
Last Week
Anchored Truth Tuesdays
~It is appreciated but not required that you follow my social media accounts
~A new Anchored Abode podcast (iTunes) has been started, and I would love for subscribers and positive reviews (SoundCloud)
~I do ask that you use the Anchored Truth Tuesdays logo above on your site somewhere or on the post itself; if you click on the picture above a new window will open with html instructions
~ Family friendly posts only (I reserve the right to delete any that are deemed inappropriate); with a direct link to a specific blog post
~It is appreciated if you spread the blogging love to those around you in the Anchored community by visiting their sites, following them, or liking/sharing posts
~We have a Pinterest group board, Anchored Truth Tuesdays, where all who link up are welcome to also upload their content–you’ll just need to like Anchored Abode first, and then request to join
~By submitting a link, you are agreeing to be added to our email list as well as allowing the use of pictures/content as featured posts on our social media accounts
I’m not much of an outdoor gardener, but I do love my houseplants. We did plant packets of wildflowers outside this year but right now we can’t tell the weeds from the flowers. 😉 I’m thankful God is a better gardener than I am!
Really appreciate the gardening imagery!