I don’t know about you but I think everyone at one point in time in their life has either had a garden or wanted one. I don’t think that there is anything better than a fresh grown tomato picked right off the vine. I always look forward to seeing the fruit and vegetables grow and look forward to the time when I can reap the harvest, the benefits of what I have sown.

One of the hardest things about a garden though is the constant upkeep. You work the soil and get it all cleared out and remove any rocks or foreign objects that are in the way that will impede the growth of your plants. You excitedly pick out the seeds that you want to grow in anticipation of the crop it will produce. You sow the seeds into the ground and time seems to stop as you wait for the first signs of life to come up out of the soil. You finally see the plants emerge and can barely contain your excitement but then you also begin to notice other items popping up in your garden that you know you didn’t sow there. You pull the couple of pesky weeds out and feel accomplished and go on about your day. You go back the next morning only to find that more weeds have popped up, your plants are growing though and as much as you would like or need to pick the weeds out, you don’t have time because you have to go to work or perform whatever tasks that are on your plate that day.

You say to yourself, I will get those weeds pulled out tonight but then the nighttime comes and you realize right before turning in for the night that you didn’t go to the garden and pick the weeds but you’re so exhausted from the day that you decided to go ahead and turn in. You say to yourself, “I will get them tomorrow, it will be fine.” You awaken the next morning and realize that the alarm didn’t go off and now you’re running late so you have to rush through the morning and run out the door. Once again, the garden is neglected but you will get to it tonight. As you get in the car to drive home for the evening you see dark clouds rolling in and just about that time the sky opens up and the rain starts pouring down. You come into the house after your drive home and you look out your back window at your garden that’s just close enough to see but too far away to make out anything clearly and think to yourself, I really need to get out there when the rain stops and check things out. However, the next day it is still raining and the forecast calls for rain for the next 3 days. You realize it will be at least a couple of days before you can get out there but think to yourself, it will be fine.

A week later the sun is out, the grounds have dried up and you walk out on your back porch with a cup of coffee in hand ready to start the day. You can’t wait to see how much your garden has grown. As you draw nearer, you see that indeed your plants have grown because of God’s amazing rain and the fertile soil He has given you but there is a problem, the plants are not the only thing that have enjoyed the rain. The weeds are all over the place and it looks like they have just about taken over. After all of your hard work you now need to put in the time and effort to clear them away so that your plants can continue to grow, be healthy and produce fruit. If only you had stayed on top of everything, this wouldn’t require so much work now.

Our lives are exactly the same. If you will think about the sentences you have just read up until this point and think of this from a spiritual perspective, I am sure that you will see how true this is in our own lives. As Christians we are constantly growing and the more that we seek, pray and spend time in His presence, the more our garden/Christian lives thrive. However, when we get caught up in our daily life and don’t make time to spend with God, our lives become like this garden and the cares of this life and the fruits of the flesh, like the weeds, begin to take over. Are there weeds in your garden? In Galatians 5:22 scripture talks about the fruit of the spirit being love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, and faithfulness. Therefore, I believe the fruit of the flesh is hatred, unhappiness, restlessness, impatience, cruelty, wickedness, and unfaithfulness. These are not qualities we should aspire to, with that said, we should always be making time for the Word and spending time with God. It is time to pull the weeds from our life, otherwise, we will find our own garden overrun and find that those weeds begin to choke out all the fruit that has developed over time through God. Let’s be diligent to pick the weeds that start to take over and beginning to nurture the fruit that has grown in our own lives so that others can partake of that fruit and see the greatness of God through you.