Love Gardening? Or just the Results?

When your injured your forced to slow down. During some downtime at home, I came across some old notebooks filled with notes and ideas that came to mind at one point or another. I take a notebook with me when I travel. Whenever I am on a flight, I jot down notes to myself and though my drawing is completely terrible, I attempt to sketch stick figure examples in arrangement to demonstrate my ideas.

A few days ago I came across something I once drew that was titled at the top of the page  “Love the garden/gardening or love the results of blooming flowers?” Some of the people in the sketch were weeding, watering, and tending a garden by physical labor on their hands and knees with bright smiles and enthusiasm. Some of the other figures were mechanically using sprinklers, fertilizer, and pesticide and were intently focused on results.

 

To me the first image vividly illustrates how important it is to realize that there is truly no good substitution for the intimacy that is involved in the process of cultivating and caring for a garden. In the second image, the intent was not in the joy of the process, but more focused on the outcome. For this illustration, I believe the word garden can be substituted for many things.

And much like a garden, the process of loving and caring for something requires time, intimacy and attention. The images I doodled reminded me that rather being fixated on a specific result, we should learn to devote more of our hearts to the process, which is more likely to produces more tangible and lasting results for ourselves and for all who are involved.

We live in a world of convenience, immediate gratification and shortcuts. We no longer put our hands into the soil and respect the fact that it is the work – the process of personally tending to something meaningful – that germinates fulfillment within us.

 

For example, talking with my family we agreed that people talk about how much they love their children, then at the least sign of trouble, they rush them off to counseling or let doctors prescribe drugs to manage their mental and emotional state. I can’t help but think that, in many cases, these recourses serve to keep many children at arm’s length when all they probably really need is to be held closer. Again, this analogy can be substituted for another to show that we look for immediate results and convenience rather then being present by putting our hands and time in the process. After I wrote this, I realized that I need to be willing to get my own hands dirty again.

I was in church once and the pastor asked the congregation the question, “Do you love God?” Everyone around me quickly answered, “Yes!” It seemed as if no one really even thought it over. I get it, but that day I decided to go beyond the surface. The questions that began to resonate in my mind were… “How can we answer that so fast?” “How can a person  mistreat a spouse, a child, a neighbor, a family member or friend, and say that they love God?” “How can we be deceitful, and say that we love God?” I realized that when these questions emerged they weren’t for anyone other than myself… I’m just sharing aloud.

I prayed a lot on these questions. I asked God to teach me, to show me how to love the way I should. I don’t believe that God keeps secrets from us. But I do believe that he keeps them hidden for us where they can only be found when we are ready to look for them by enjoying the process of intimacy with Him, with caring, and with cultivation.

As I sat and pondered these questions, I came to the realization that the reason I was so plagued with them, was because God was in the process of getting His hands dirty with me.

Examine your heart, learn to love the process. If love conquers all, imagine what it will produce when you apply it to the process.