Tending the Garden of My Soul

When I moved to Virginia, far from my roots in Texas, I found the garden beds around the house were overgrown and in desperate need of care. No one had lived in this house for a long time. Everything had been taken over by the absence of a Gardner.

I started with the area I envisioned for my herbs. I remember the sweat was rolling down my back. As I labored, the weeds seemed to have taken over from anything that could grow or be useful or beautiful. Most were very difficult to remove and covered with painful, white thorns.

I remember pulling and pulling. I was desperately trying to make room for the bounty that I had imagined for this place. A place where something new could grow. Slowly, I worked one area at a time until I could see the fresh soil underneath.

It had occurred to me at this time that these weeds were just like a lot of other things I was trying to remove from my life.

Things like worry and fear, doubt, betrayal, and anger. The weeds of my soul. Weeds that I had feared really had started to deeply root. Each one needed to be pulled out. I needed to make room for something beautiful to take their place.

Something of God. Something that brought me joy. Something worthwhile. I remember pulling and imagining my worry being replaced with peace, my fear being replaced with courage, my doubt with trust, and my anger with self-control.

Useful things…..things with a good intention and things that brought more peace.

You see our hearts are just like a garden. We have to be careful what we let grow there. They need to be nurtured and cared for. We can’t allow bad things to grow. If we are not careful they can become full of weeds that are rooted and deep. Some of them are much harder to remove. That is why we need a master Gardner to guide our way, help us with the seasons and protect us from things that grow in this world but not in the next.

In Mark 4, Jesus taught the parable of the soils to His disciples. Christ said spiritual fruitfulness or barrenness depended upon the type of soil that received the seed of God’s Word.

Jesus warned of the choking influence of thorns and weeds.

He answered, “The one who sowed the good seed is the Son of Man. The field is the world, and the good seed stands for the sons of the kingdom. The weeds are the sons of the evil one, and the enemy who sows them is the devil. The harvest is the end of the age, and the harvesters are angels.” (Matthew 13)