In the summer of 2015, the kids and I were able to visit our closest friends and their family in South Dakota and Minnesota. It’s crazy to realize that was eleven years ago, but I digress. We had a great time. The weather was beautiful, definitely cooler than Texas, and it was wonderful to see everyone. Plus, the kids and I got to explore a part of the United States we had never seen before.
We mainly stayed in South Dakota because that is where my friend’s parents live. One of the many things I admired during our stay was their garden. They have a real gift for raising one of the most productive gardens I have ever seen, rows and rows of all kinds of vegetables. In fact, they could probably feed ten families from their produce. This garden, though, takes a lot of work. First, they put a lot of work into preparing the soil. In fact, it took them three years to feel confident that they had the soil just right. My friend’s mother works on the garden practically every day making sure there are no weeds, harmful bugs, or watering needs, etc.
It made me think about how we should be working just as hard, if not harder, at taking care of our spiritual garden. Our inner being is the soil, the word is good seed, and our Messiah is the water (Mark 4:14 & John 4:14). If we aren’t taking care of our soil and protecting the good seed, we won’t have any good fruit to share, and we risk bad seed to come in and chocking the good seed.
This idea also reminded me how our carnal flesh produces the bad seed within us that eventually grows into weeds—jealousy, anger, strife, bitterness, and other sins. For healthy plants to thrive, you can’t allow many weeds. The weeds will choke the healthy plants. It is amazing to see even a thorny vine destroy a large healthy tree. Something so small can overtake something much larger. Therefore, we have to make sure we are constantly, daily, weeding out our inner weeds because if we don’t, the weeds will choke the word planted in us and make us unfruitful (Mark 4:18-19).
We should desire to have “good soil” within us, so that the word, “the seed,” can grow bearing an abundance of good fruit (Mark 4:20). We know that a healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit and an unhealthy tree cannot bear good fruit (Matt 7:16-17). Therefore, we have to keep ourselves healthy, so that we bear good fruit, for we are known by our fruits.
Another thought came to me about this agricultural analogy: when gardeners have an overabundance of produce, they usually share it with others. In the same way, one of the main purposes of growing healthy spiritual fruit is to share it. Fruit contains seeds that can grow new plants. When we share our fruit with others, they too can grow and eventually share with others—kind of like “paying it forward.” We spread the seeds around us so God’s people can grow and bear good fruit—thirtyfold, sixtyfold, and a hundredfold (Mark 4:20).
So, be mindful of protecting the seed of God’s word within you. Provide it with good soil, weed it daily, and let the Messiah’s Spirit water it. Bear good fruit that you can in turn share with others.