For our first week of all-squad month we partnered with Lightforce International and divided up to tackle a multitude of responsibilities on a farm in Lehze, Albania. Because of my interest in growing my own food at some point in life, I volunteered for the gardening team. We were promptly taken to a small four-row garden with cabbage, peppers, and lettuce (there were other plants, but I can’t recall them). Our instructions were to weed the garden, and weed it we did. I was pleasantly surprised by the number of large tubs we filled with pulled weeds, and wow, did that garden look super nice when we were done.
Here’s the bad news. I didn’t learn anything about gardening. (Ok, so I did learn how to
aerate soil, but for the sake of a dramatic transition I didn’t learn anything).
Here’s the good news, the entire time I worked in the garden my fellow squadmates were up for a chat, and we were able to discuss scripture and life experiences, and we discovered a handful of metaphors (maybe even modern day parables) that gave us good chuckles, and even some deep moments of gratitude to our Father in Heaven.
There’s a host of garden and farm symbolism in the bible, what with wheat and chaff and all, and the vine and the branches, and fruit-bearing. To that, I’ll add a pretty obvious
conclusion that weeds are like sin and in order to have a functioning garden you have to
pull them out. Here I will appeal to my fellow gardeners and weed pullers, because they’ll understand the frustration and the hard work. Some of those roots are deep. Some of
those sins have been ignored for so long that they are firm in the garden that is our
hearts, and removing those is very difficult and very tricky. Some of those sins have
intertwined their roots with the food-bearing plants and removing them improperly (or in
some cases, removing them at all) is damaging.
Sometimes those deep roots are easily concealed. Maybe we’ve grabbed the top part of a weed and gave it a good hard tug that breaks the plant apart. We can no longer see the weed above ground, and we say, “Ha! Gotcha.” But those roots are still there, and they will surely sprout a new stem and return as a full-grown weed without proper care. To me that seems like the wordly way to deal with sin, and we need a perfect gardener who can remove every last root in entirety and perfection.
And thank you so much, God, that your son’s sacrifice is the perfect removal of all of our
sins.
I can say with honesty that there were some roots that I left in the garden. Some were tiny and seemed harmless, some were just too hard to remove without a full excavation of
that square foot, and, I’m sad to say, I’m not a perfect gardener, and I do not have the
patience or the energy to remove every single weed. But thank you, God, that you are perfect and patient.
Side note, don’t forget that you have to let God in for him to pull out those roots.
We also dealt with one heck of a weed. I’m no botanist, so I don’t know the name of this
particular fiend, but it was a cross between grass and a vine, but didn’t strongly resemble
what showed up when I googled “crabgrass.” This thing had a central root, but each stem that grew outward would sprout its own roots and proceed to grow. I can’t help but think of this thing as sin because of its invasive nature and the proficiency with which it spread. Things like addiction and bitterness will rapidly branch out and begin overtaking other parts of your life if left unmanaged.
And now for something completely different. A small revelation came to me about worms as well. Sometimes the placement of food and animals in the world blows me away and makes me appreciate just how much planning and detail went into creation.
Worms are so useful! They recycle waste, they aerate the garden, they add healthy
nurtrients, and even help with proper drainage. What?! Super cool. They’re a handy piece in the ecosystem, but what really struck me is that they’re able to survive the human onslaught. I cut several worms into pieces in my weed-digging and aerating, but these little guys persisted. I’m fully confident that God knew that we would garden and he created a little critter that would support our gardening endeavors and be resistant to accidental dismemberment. It seems a little TOO convenient, if you ask me.
In my last thought I want to observe the definition of a weed. A pretty loose non-Oxford
English Dictionary caliber definition reads: “a wild plant growing where it is not wanted
and in competition with cultivated plants.”
Let me toss in a disclaimer to make it overwhelmingly clear that I am not attempting to
debunk the comparisons I made in the above paragraphs, but am looking at weeds, particularly the plants that we define as weeds, in a different way.
The most prominent factor in defining a weed, in my opinion, is “unwanted.” Want is
subjective, and can lead to sad occurences, I think. For example, we pulled spearmint from a potted plant because the spearmint didn’t belong. It was sad to remove the spearmint. I would rather have planted it somewhere else for it to grow and flourish, but it didn’t belong, so it was cast away. (As a happy side note, we kept the spearmint and used it for tea, headaches, and air-fresheners).
I think that the world defines people as weeds rather liberally. One example is the A.D.D.
“epidemic” for children in the U.S. who are given medication to calm them down instead of
allowing for time or programs to let them learn and develop in the way that their brains
would receive and flourish.
We can also observe the different kind of intelligence that humans have and how that reflects on their circumstances. Take a room full of mathematicians and drop an artist in the middle of them and it won’t be long before the artist starts feeling like a weed. Take a
mathematician into an art room and the same will happen. One of the most beautiful things I’ve been seeing here on the World Race is a Godly openness to our differences and our gifts from God and how we can all be uniquely utilized and celebrated in so many different ways.
I can feel overwhelmingly useless in one situation, and be top dog in something completely different, and that’s not because I’m bad or not well rounded (going off of nature here, folks, not nurture, so stipulate with me) it’s because God designed me with specific strengths and weaknesses in mind to make me uniquely me.
I and another squad-mate of mine have memories of collecting dandelions and presenting them to our parents as flowers. I remember making a super-impressive bouquet of the things and I was overwhelmingly proud (I also think that dandelions are beautiful as the tiny yellow flowers). Unfortunately, dandelions are commonly regarded as weeds, so our gifts were received with mixed emotions.
I can think of a host of “weeds” that are so beautiful. I can also recollect times of me
pointing out a lovely flower and hearing, “Yeah, it’s pretty, but it’s a weed.” Or, “It’s
just a wildflower” (implying that it’s not a REAL flower).
I think a great deal of love and understanding can come from not looking at people as weeds or flowers in their gifts and talents (again, nature not nurture), and being more accepting and loving. Some of the most wonderful, loving, faithful, and loyal people in my life were regarded as weeds and I would not have their blessings and beauty had I regarded them as weeds as well. I also feel like I was regarded as a weed for large portions of my life, but the amazing and wonderful thing is that God created the weeds too, and weeds are exceptionally adept in ways that flowers are not.
Unfortunately, my time in Albania is now at an end, so my pursuit of gardening knowledge
will have to be put on hold. Quite fortunately, we’ve moved to Greece and are now working with the Syrian refugee crisis. I covet your prayers and also need support still.
Like always, thank you so much for your time, and God bless.
