Now that it’s summer, my vegetable garden is almost overflowing. I go out every day to tend it, watering and weeding, admiring the cucumbers, examining the zucchini, smelling the tomatoes and petting the parsley. But for all my care and attention, I’m not the one who makes the garden grow. God does.
Through the miracles we call light, water, earth and air, God is transforming the tiny dry seeds that I so hopefully put into their little pots last March into a bounty of beautiful, delicious, nutritious vegetables. All I have to do is tend the garden and harvest its riches, while God, through nature, does the rest.
Yes, God quietly brings forth abundance every day in our gardens and in our lives. Everything we have comes from our endlessly generous and loving God, who is always at work in our gardens, in our lives and all around us.
We can’t possibly pay God back for this unending generosity – but we can surely pay it forward. What will you do with what God has done in your garden? What will you do with what God has done in your life?
This message is excerpted from “Who makes my garden grow?” by Audrey Novak Riley from the June 28, 2023, blog of the Women of the ELCA.
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