Weeds

So I've been aggravated lately with the amount of weeds I've been getting in my front yard this spring. Why are they so bad? Why don't the neighbor's lawns seem to have them so bad? I sprayed them over and over last year so where did these all multiply from? This has created an eye for looking around and noticing other weeds everywhere I go - so I think to myself, "Why did God make weeds? What is the purpose?"

And as often as it happens to me my answer is revealed in the middle of the night and there it was. Weeds are there to be noticed and removed just as are the people in this world who do not believe in Christ. They live among beautiful flowers and grass sharing the soil because they too need to have a chance to grow, but little do they know why they there or that they are actually planted on purpose or what that purpose is so they are often short lived.

The weeds in a sense provide discernment and discipline to the gardener to take careful care to the garden they are tending to. They provide diversity in that they provide a way to recognize right from wrong. However to those that don't know the danger, the weeds have their way to tempt us to sow their seed. Remember being a child and how hard it was to resist your mother's instruction to not blow those fluffy parachute feather dusters just to see them float in the air? In fact come to think of it you and I fell in love with that dandelion the first time we saw it when we were children because it was so appealing! But now we know better, right?

The parable of weeds is spoken in Matthew 13:38, "The field is the world, and the good seed stands for the sons of the kingdom. The weeds are the sons of the evil one, 39 and the enemy who sows them is the devil. The harvest is the end of the age, and the harvesters are angels." NIV

So how can we learn to love and exist with weeds in this field we live in? How can we bring them to the Word so that they too will believe? How then? We can be examples, we can pray, we can provide revelation, we can help shine the Lords' light and life by our continuing to witness the truth to them. Most of all we can persevere in living for Christ and following Him because the way we live probably impacts these weeds more than ever. I want someday someone to seek God for the same blessings for that which I have received and for that person to find Him in their life during these end times.

So the weeds in my lawn will continue to be more noticeable than I want them to be as they grow faster than the grass trying to the reach the sun and that is when I too see myself, someone who isn't always perfect, not always beautiful to the eye that beholds it, but alive and strong just the same given His light. I too am a weed, a sinner, but now I am living for a different purpose and knowing what that purpose is and every day is a new start and I am forgiven of my sins!

Because of my Savior I have been able to discern things right from wrong but am far from perfect. I will constantly be molded by Him to learn to harvest the soil around me. I know by hope, faith, trust, and perseverance I will become the good seed that is spoken about in Matthew. There are so many things that provide growth for even a small mustard seed; trust, faith, kindness, forgiveness, and love. This is all God wants from us and while I don't understand it, I don't need to. It is the truth and the way. Love is God and God is love and God sent his only son to the world, not to one religion or the other but to the world! Praise God! Just think, there is always a new season for a new harvest and you can never be too late to accept Him! Never! Never too late, not even for a theif on the cross!

So today I pray for the perseverance, strength, enlightenment, and love for God that I have to remain to continue to focus on my purpose and then I shall always know it! AMEN!