HOW DOES YOUR GARDEN GROW?
Life is like a garden; it will produce whatever is planted and nurtured in it. Your life can be a beautiful garden, or it can be a tangled, unkempt mass of undergrowth. It isn’t easy to keep a well-organized life, but it can be done. To do this, one must first become a Christian by obeying the gospel of Christ. Then, he must plant in his garden the Christian graces. Peter tell us: “And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; and to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness; and to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness love.” (2 Pet.1:5-7). If these characteristics are to develop in our lives, we must carefully weed from our garden of life those things that hinder. We must remove the desires for worldliness. We must be interested in serving God rather than our own selfish lusts.
If we keep our lives free from these evils, we can have time to cultivate the Christian characteristics. We cannot, however, add virtue, which is purity of life, if we clutter our lives with the sensuous pleasures of this world. We cannot develop brotherly kindness if we harbor selfishness in our lives. And, how can we develop love in our hearts if we let them be filled with pride?
If our
gardens are to grow properly, after planting, we must cultivate with Christian
fellowship and water generously with the word of God. A garden untended, will be taken over by
weeds. This principle is true in the
Spiritual realm the same as the temporal.
If you neglect Christian fellowship and a study of God’s word, then
Satan will move in; worldly activities will soon become more important than
anything else, and after a while even the thoughts of God will be crowded
out. However, if you will put the