Soul Trained

My husband and I are trying our hands at gardening this year. Maybe our name will somehow prophesy to our thumbs. :) I'm attempting a vertical method since we have a small backyard. Eight 4x8 raised beds with posts and garden fencing slicing lengthwise down their middles. Supposedly I can plant more this way, train the climbing varieties skyward and thereby gain a fantastic harvest. Emphasis on the 'supposedly'.

Ordinarily the cucumbers, peas and beans would flop over onto the ground and ramble happily about, but I will affix them securely to their vertical prison and all that extra sun will cause them to raise their figurative skirts and show me their bounty. Ha. :) I'm a little ridiculous.

This past year I've been trying to define something in myself. In the past I've struggled with rules and guidance of any sort and I had assumed that I was just rebellious. After many years of heart examination I became uncomfortable with that conclusion, so I took it to God. While I've been getting dirt under my fingernails, I think He has been giving me a word picture.

I'm like that climbing variety of vegetable; trained to adhere to a stiff guidance system pointed directly skywards. In my childhood I was taught all about God's laws. Jesus added a new tier of rules; ones that governed heart and not just behavior. So from a very young age I developed a fear of God, and learned that  not only was He watching everything I do, He was aware of every thought, feeling and motivation I had inside me. I began examining my heart when I invited Jesus into my life at the age of six.  I'm not even going to go into the whole understanding of Jesus coming to fulfill the law, or that we have freedom in Christ stuff. I realize that now. What I had back in my childhood was training without relationship. God the Father and God the Son and God the Holy Spirit was just another mother, father, prosecutor and judge. I was on the examining board at all times. Everything I did was observed, and every thought questioned. But I had no idea of His love for me. The love that forgives. The God-ocean of love that I float in; that gave Himself for me. Because I was worth it. Training without relationship is like training a plant to a trellis without first planting it in good soil. Tying a plant to a stake will not feed it. All the rules in the world will only bring death in the end.

Jesus came that we might have life, and life abundant. All He wants is relationship. All the rules in the world cannot achieve that. The Hebrews were given a chance at relationship but they were afraid. They chose rules. The law was given to expose sin, not to give us a path to redemption. Or to relationship. Moses chose intimacy and relationship. He got to hear God's voice, become God's friend and even had the opportunity to argue with God. A relationship birthed in fire. That's what I want. To hell with my trellis. ;)