Thursday, July 17, 2008

The Accidental Gardener

1 Kings 17:6 (New American Standard Bible) The ravens brought him bread and meat in the morning and bread and meat in the evening, and he would drink from the brook. This morning, as I went out to water my plants, I was reminded of Elijah again. Not because we've experienced miracles, or turned bears onto our enemies, or raised anyone from the dead, but because of the birds of the air.
We love to watch the birds and see their personalities, their habits, their babies, their songs etc. When we first started putting out food for the birds and squirrel, we thought *Look how we're helping the birds*, little did we know how God would take a simple act to reroute our thinking.
I'm not sure when it happened - probably some early morning when God was watching our family or maybe He was just watching the birds. He probably used one of those annoying black birds - the crow or gackle or perhaps the cowbird. But an astonishing thing happened as I was out walking in our yard - I discovered that God (via the birds) had planted corn and sunflowers in our yard. Granted, we've not grown corn or sunflowers here before, so that is why He probably only let them plant just 3 (two stalks of corn and 1 sunflower). I've carefully watered, protected them (from the every ready hands of "I almost chopped the weeds down" Dave), and watched them grow in wonder.
We were excited at first to discover we had TWO ears of corn, but now we're up to 5 ears. Just enough for a meal or two. It was such a humble reminder in this day - when we're so consumsed with "By my self" and "Do it MY way" mentality, that God really is the one who is taking care of us. If I were just to just let go and let Him instead of thinking that I have to be in control, how many more wonders would we discover? Would my life be easier? I'm not sure, but I would probably wonder and worry over a whole lot less than I do now! What do I need to let go of and let Him handle? My health? My kids? My Marriage? Okay, how about my Life? Yep, I think that about sums it up!
Matthew 6:26 (New American Standard Bible) 26"Look at the birds of the air, that they do not sow, nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not worth much more than they?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I've just been doubley blessed today by your words!