Wild Thing

We picked up some pretty bedding plants at the nursery. The few we’d planned to buy multiplied into a couple of dozen, so we set to in the garden when we got home. Ground needed clearing. Bulbs lifted and replanted. Weeds dispensed with.

Later, I realised I couldn’t see out of my fly-spotted kitchen window. Washed it, and the dining room ones, which then meant I needed to go outside to do them to get the full effect (which is wonderful!). But in order to reach the windows outside, I had to trim back dead branches, clear up more spring detritus.

My prayer window is dirty. It’s next on the list, but I notice the bush outside is sprouting in all directions and will need trimming before I can reach the window.

There is more to do than I have time or energy to do. Some of it will just remain wild.

God is working on my inner being. He’s not limited by anything, but he knows that I am, and in his mercy and love, he leaves some bits wild while he polishes up some others. My soul is a bit like my garden. Some of it is flowering and fragrant, and some of it is weedy and unproductive.

But praise God for his mercy and love, because he never gives up on me.

Gale Force Winds

The sun is warm and smiling in a mottled sky, while grey and white clouds stream past it carried along on the high winds. In like a lion (March 1st) and out like a lion (March 31st) it seems this year. Not a lamb in sight.

High in the sky but also down here on earth, the winds are fierce and icy. Too wild to take the fireside ash out to deposit in the bin – I would have been covered in grey grit myself. Too unpredictable to venture out in. 

Or am I missing something by hunkering down inside? Is there exhilaration and drama to be found out there in the wild winds? Perhaps, though in my imagination the only drama is in dodging a flying tree branch!

Some churches, some Christians, avoid exposing themselves to the unpredictable and wild winds of the Holy Spirit. They shut their hearts and their doors, metaphorically speaking, to his presence and prefer the safe version they choose to believe. A Holy Spirit who comforts and teaches, who inspires and guides. Which is true but isn’t all he does.

The Spirit blows where he wills, Scripture says. Nobody knows why, or where he came from, or where he is going. But the disciples on that first Pentecost couldn’t exclude him from the upper room, and when he blew in he blew out any resistance and fear and filled them with faith and power. 

I may choose to stay inside today while the wild wind whips round the building, but I am open and willing for the Holy Spirit to blow wild and untamed in my life, inspiring my thoughts and energising my faith and giving me power to live life to the full and see Jesus’ kingdom come and his will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Amen.              

Drought?

I can’t remember the last time it rained. 

 

That is a rare sentence to utter in Scotland.

The paths which Dusty and I tread, usually shod in wellies because of the mud, are dry and cracked. I can walk in trainers again. Never sandals – there are ticks in that grass, deposited by the lovely deer which roam free hereabouts. The deer are lovely; the ticks are not.

The postie mentioned the other day that the weeding was easy in his garden right now because they’re just not growing. I’d not noticed – we have a pretty big garden and there are always weeds pretty much everywhere. The wild look. Partially tamed; mostly wild. 

Anyway, then I did notice, that not only are the weeds looking stunted, so are the carrots. And peas. And beans. 

Everything needs a drink.

So, I guess the writer of Ecclesiastes should have added another line to his famously poetic to-do list.

...a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot...

Here he should have inserted “ ... a time to water and a time to refrain from watering ...”

The message of Ecclesiastes is balance, and wisdom to discern what time it is. 

I don’t need God to tell me to water my flowers and veggies. But maybe, on this occasion, I needed the postie.

That’s another thing I love about this world. We were created to depend on God; we were also created to live in community and help one another. 

Most of the rest of the Bible tells us how to try to do that.