Are there any spiritual types to gardening in raised beds? Maybe. Out of all the people on the earth, God chose Abraham, plucked him up and planted him in a special place, a very fruitful place. (Genesis 12:1) Did Abraham deserve it? No. God just picked him out to be a recipient of his blessings because He wanted a special people. God has always wanted a special people, a chosen people. God took special care of Abraham's children because He had a plan. All of mankind had become hybridized with sin, and God wanted to bring at least some of them back to original Word children. Through the planting and the tending of His special little garden, He finally brought forth Jesus Christ. The Seed had come to perfection. Now He planted the perfect Seed, but instead of planting It in the earth, He planted It in heaven. It did go into the earth, but the earth couldn't hold It. He is risen! Instead of planting the Seed in geographical Canaan, He plants It in spiritual Canaan, which is human hearts that have been prepared to receive Him. As the physical seed of Abraham entered Canaan by faith in the promises of God, so does the spiritual Seed of Abraham enter your heart by faith. Then, as the Israelites went forth to conquer and to cleanse the land, so does Jesus Christ come in and take out the giants of sin and wickedness in your heart. And finally, when you have come to full maturity, then you are counted as pure-bred seed! If you have received the Life of Christ, you are Abraham’s Seed as He is the Seed of Abraham, and children of the promise. (Romans 9: 7-8 and Gal. 3: 26-29) And God has a special place to plant you and nourish you! If you are a child, maybe God has given you Christian parents to give you special care and attention. Maybe you are blessed to have a good church you can go to for Christian fellowship and good Sunday School teaching. But even if you don't have any of this, there is a special place for you! And that is in the arms of Jesus! You get there by spending time in prayer and in reading the Bible. Whenever any kind of trouble touches your life, just talk to Jesus about it! No matter what happens in your life, whether good or bad, talk to Jesus about it. Take Him with you everywhere you go! That is your special privilege. That is your 'raised bed' (sitting in heavenly places).
God bless you!
Saturday, April 21, 2012
Friday, April 20, 2012
The Garden Of God
Just like there are three essential elements to any good garden, there are three things that every Christian must have in order to bear fruit that is pleasing to God. A good vegetable garden needs light, water, and good soil.
Let's talk about light first. The Bible establishes the fact that Jesus is the Light of the world. (John 1:4-9; John 8:12; John 9:5) How is He that Light, or how can you make use of that Light in your life? In this example, Jesus Christ is the Word. (John 1:14) Just like a plant needs a certain amount of sunlight each day, a Christian needs to spend a certain amount of time in the Word. This can happen in different ways. Reading the Bible, listening to a sermon, talking about Scripture with other people, meditating on the Word, or even spending time in prayer is like basking in the Son. This is absolutely vital. The plants in your garden can not live very long, and certainly not bear fruit without sunlight. So does a Christian get weak and malnourished when he goes too long without spending time in the Word. On the other hand, if you abide in Him, and He abides in you, then you become the light of the world as well. (Matthew 5:14)
The water represents the Holy Spirit. As a seed cannot even sprout without moisture, so no one can even begin the Christian life without the working of the Holy Spirit. (John 6:44) As a plant must be watered regularly in order to grow well and bear fruit, so must a Christian be watered with the Holy Spirit. As a plant can never grow to maturity and bear fruit with only sunlight and no water, so can a Christian never fulfill his God-ordained purpose by having only the Word and not the Spirit that uttered the Word in the first place. You might read the Bible and listen to a sermon every day; you might be able to quote whole chapters from the Bible; you might be in church every time the doors are open; you might know all the major doctrines and understand church order, and still not have the Holy Ghost. You might understand all spiritual mysteries, and have all spiritual knowledge, and faith to remove mountains, and still not be filled with the Holy Ghost. (I Cor. 13:2) And until you are filled with the Holy Ghost, you cannot properly fill your place in the garden of God. A Christian can grow some and even bear some fruit simply by being in the presence of the Holy Spirit, either by being under the preaching of the Word or taking part in anointed worship, but once he gets filled and sealed by the Holy Ghost by a personal experience, THEN he is like a tree that is planted by the river of God. (Psalm 1) Now he himself becomes a fountain of Living Water. That doesn't mean he can now do away with Christian fellowship, the Word, or any of that. It simply means that instead of just enjoying the blessings of God, he now becomes a source of It! (John 7:38)
So how do you get planted by this River? Only God can do that. But there are a few things that you can do. You must die to yourself and die to the world. Let that Word and the Spirit do it's work on you. You can saturate yourself with it. Let it mellow you, break you up. In this example, we could say the soil is your heart (Mark 4:15, Luke 8:15). Your heart is what needs to be prepared to receive the Word seeds and the Holy Ghost water. In the old days they would use a plow, turning it upside down (symbolizing repentance). Now they use a tiller, which chops and cuts and sifts through the soil (like taking correction from the Master Gardener). This soil needs to be cultivated, broken up, rocks and trash taken out (sanctification). I find it very striking, too, that the most fertile soil is that which has large amounts of organic matter, or compost in it (dead stuff), which shows that the more you can die to yourself and the world, the better the Seed of God's Word can grow in you and bear fruit that pleases Him.
And this is only the beginning. It only gets better as we go along. God bless you until next time!
Let's talk about light first. The Bible establishes the fact that Jesus is the Light of the world. (John 1:4-9; John 8:12; John 9:5) How is He that Light, or how can you make use of that Light in your life? In this example, Jesus Christ is the Word. (John 1:14) Just like a plant needs a certain amount of sunlight each day, a Christian needs to spend a certain amount of time in the Word. This can happen in different ways. Reading the Bible, listening to a sermon, talking about Scripture with other people, meditating on the Word, or even spending time in prayer is like basking in the Son. This is absolutely vital. The plants in your garden can not live very long, and certainly not bear fruit without sunlight. So does a Christian get weak and malnourished when he goes too long without spending time in the Word. On the other hand, if you abide in Him, and He abides in you, then you become the light of the world as well. (Matthew 5:14)
The water represents the Holy Spirit. As a seed cannot even sprout without moisture, so no one can even begin the Christian life without the working of the Holy Spirit. (John 6:44) As a plant must be watered regularly in order to grow well and bear fruit, so must a Christian be watered with the Holy Spirit. As a plant can never grow to maturity and bear fruit with only sunlight and no water, so can a Christian never fulfill his God-ordained purpose by having only the Word and not the Spirit that uttered the Word in the first place. You might read the Bible and listen to a sermon every day; you might be able to quote whole chapters from the Bible; you might be in church every time the doors are open; you might know all the major doctrines and understand church order, and still not have the Holy Ghost. You might understand all spiritual mysteries, and have all spiritual knowledge, and faith to remove mountains, and still not be filled with the Holy Ghost. (I Cor. 13:2) And until you are filled with the Holy Ghost, you cannot properly fill your place in the garden of God. A Christian can grow some and even bear some fruit simply by being in the presence of the Holy Spirit, either by being under the preaching of the Word or taking part in anointed worship, but once he gets filled and sealed by the Holy Ghost by a personal experience, THEN he is like a tree that is planted by the river of God. (Psalm 1) Now he himself becomes a fountain of Living Water. That doesn't mean he can now do away with Christian fellowship, the Word, or any of that. It simply means that instead of just enjoying the blessings of God, he now becomes a source of It! (John 7:38)
So how do you get planted by this River? Only God can do that. But there are a few things that you can do. You must die to yourself and die to the world. Let that Word and the Spirit do it's work on you. You can saturate yourself with it. Let it mellow you, break you up. In this example, we could say the soil is your heart (Mark 4:15, Luke 8:15). Your heart is what needs to be prepared to receive the Word seeds and the Holy Ghost water. In the old days they would use a plow, turning it upside down (symbolizing repentance). Now they use a tiller, which chops and cuts and sifts through the soil (like taking correction from the Master Gardener). This soil needs to be cultivated, broken up, rocks and trash taken out (sanctification). I find it very striking, too, that the most fertile soil is that which has large amounts of organic matter, or compost in it (dead stuff), which shows that the more you can die to yourself and the world, the better the Seed of God's Word can grow in you and bear fruit that pleases Him.
And this is only the beginning. It only gets better as we go along. God bless you until next time!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)