First Fruits from our Garden

(edited :) July 3,2008 ; Grammatically improved : )

The First Fruits from the Wiggins Family Garden June 12, 2008
Last night we picked our first fruits of Charles and Chris's labor of the ground. The expanded and turned the soil (clay with top soil added). We actually had to buy dirt :) . They planted the seeds and the plants, watered it and waited. Today we reaped what they sowed. Moreover, as we held the beautiful, favorite vegetables I thought none of this was possible without God. The plants and seeds are from Him, the strength and ability to plant them and the dirt to plant them in are from Him, the sun and water that make the plants grow are from Him.

A thankfulness and peace came over me, what an object lesson for Works and Grace. You can work, because of Christ and God's gift of life and you can choose what you do, all things are worked for our good. The boys tilling the ground and unloading the dirt was hard, but it was necessary to reap the benefit of the vegetables the expanded garden is going to produce for a fraction of the cost of buying them in the store. We have the added benefit of the beautiful plants to look at as we sip our coffee in the morning and thank God, for all the blessing He has given us. The breath we have, the dirt under our feet, the house in front of us, each other, and most of all Him, we can "see" Him everyday by just looking out the window.

When I look at the garden, it makes me think of the Cain and Abel story. I wonder if Cain had a thankful heart and saw God's part in the harvest he offered to God. From the scriptures you get and feeling that he attributed all the results to himself because He tended and cared for the plants and harvested it, but He missed the main contributor. Sometimes we can do all the right "Work" and the reaping is not what we expected or our heart was not tended to properly and we harvest the wrong attitude and miss reaping the real benefit. Everything we do, Every breath we take is to bring Glory. Everything we do, say and own should help us achieve that goal, should point us toward our relationship with God.


I love that God teaches us in our learning style, I am visual and He floods my day with visual messages that have made my bible verses explode off the page. And I have struggled with Works(Law) and Grace for years and all of the sudden He showed me in a very personal way and it was like biting into a fresh tomato, it was sweet, wet and oh..so good.