"Thank You God It's Mama's Planting Season"

There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens...A time to plant and a time to uproot. Eccelsiastes 3:1,2 NIV 

Every night we try to have a family prayer time. Most nights we are all together (minus our daughter who is an adult and out on her own). I'd like to say we have great spiritual times of prayer, praise and worship but we don't. It seems like by the time we are ready for bed, we are dead tired (check that--I AM THE TIRED ONE), and we are just fortunate to have a few minutes to pray.

However, every once in awhile, one of us will pray something that reminds me of how much God is involved in our prayer time, when we come with a sincere heart. Last night was one of those nights.

We have a rather long garden at the end of our backyard. Most every year, except for when I let the garden rest, I do a garden. I don't always do it the full length but this year, I decided to go big. My husband tilled the garden for me the other day. That is a daunting process in and of itself. However, not quite as much as the planting process.

My day Saturday began with several ventures to stores and even a garden expo. I knew this was going to be my day to plant so I wanted to try and find some good deals on good plants. It wasn't only plants I found but I happened to find some pretty good deals on flowers for my flower beds. By the time I got home it was about noon. Once everything was unloaded, I looked at the bounty of plants/flowers and said "Sometimes, I think I bite off more than I can chew." Alas, it was .

Don't get me wrong. I love gardening. But the sheer task of digging, planting, digging, planting, digging, planting (sensing a pattern here?).....it was a day long task. I planted, cantaloupe, strawberries, blueberries, potatoes, corn, pumpkins, butternut squash, zucchini, yellow straightneck squash, cucumbers, broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, lettuce, radishes, asparagus, onions, cilantro, peppers, tomatoes, several flowering bushes and at least 2 flats of flowers. I'm tired just typing all of that, let alone planting it.

So noon-thirty came and my task began. Planting. Flower planting. Seed planting. Plant planting. Come about 4:30, I decided to eat lunch as my back by this time was in excruciating pain. 5:15 rolls around and it's time to get back out there. Thankfully by about 5:45, my husband came home and wonderfully offered to help. After sending him to the store for one more item (a soaker hose), he offers to help dig. Which was an answer to prayer. I ached from the top of my head to my toenails, literally. Whoever said that farming, albeit in a much smaller proportion in my case, was not hard has never planted a garden by themselves before.

By 8:15, after cleaning up the garden and yard area, we were done. I wondered again to myself, 'why do I do this to myself -- biting off more than I can chew?'. I was exhausted. I was hungry. I was so drained that it was all I could do to step in the shower. Why do I do this?

 As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest,
cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night
will never cease.” Genesis 8:22 NIV

You may have heard this before. Your church pastor may have even preached it before. Shoot, you probably heard it on TBN, Daystar or whatever your religious tv channel of choice is. I don't know, but how many sermons focus on the tithing principle when it comes to this. More than enough. What about just the sheer "work" involved

"Then he said to his disciples, the harvest is plentiful but the workers are few." Matthew 9:37 NIV

 

 

Why are the workers few? Think about it. Why are they few? If a people KNEW there was a harvest, wouldn't there be plenty of people wanting to be there? Maybe, maybe not. Or maybe...and I could be taking it completely our of context here (note: I am not a bible scholar), just maybe the workers are few because of what's required just to plant the seed. There is a plentiful harvest sure, but you can't have the harvest without the seed. And you can't even plant the seed without putting forth the effort to get it planted in the ground.

I had to work very hard to plant my garden. Very hard. Shoot, I had to work hard just to have the money to get the seeds/plants/flowers in the first place. I am a worker, no doubt about it. If I had not worked, I would have had seed. If I didn't have seed, I couldn't have worked to plant it. If I did not work hard to plant it, I wouldn't have anything to put my time/effort/energy into to bring forth a crop. If I didn't work hard to harvest my crop, we wouldn't have the vegetables for the summer for ourselves or to share with others. Workers work. Workers harvest.

Now mind you, I wasn't necessarily thinking about it this way when my whole body ached yesterday while planting my garden. It wasn't until our prayer time last night that I was reminded of it.

One of the first things out of our youngest son's mouth last night for prayer: "Thank you God that this is Mama's planting season."

**Swallowing hard here**

Mama's planting season. I worked extremely hard yesterday just to "plant". Nothing harvested yesterday. Just "planted". And my son was thankful.

Good prayer time last night.

Until next time,

RSPSSunny