Change can be difficult, even when you want it.
For instance, this past week, it was hard work to weed the flower beds because they’d been neglected for a couple of years. I wanted the flowers to look their best, but it’s been difficult to find the time for yard work. Once I did, the job was a challenge. It took hard work with a hoe to get the job done.
As I pulled weeds from the midst of daffodils, I kept thinking of how similar that was to pulling weeds out of our lives.
It doesn’t matter if it is an unwanted attitude that hangs around, an unhealthy hobby or habit that we’ve acquired, or an addiction that’s truly harmful, if we neglect dealing with something that blocks our relationship with God and with others, it soon becomes hard to change.
It doesn’t have to be a serious sin, even something as simple as overeating or spending too much time on FaceBook can be difficult to modify. And yet, neglecting to deal with the issue can be harmful to our physical and spiritual life.
Like the weeds that grow in the midst of flowers, they compete for control and eventually take a serious toll.
Notice how these facts about garden weeds also apply to weeds in our souls which hamper our lives.
- It’s hard work to pull weeds. Once they’re there, they want to stay.
- The longer we allow the weeds to remain, the more difficult they are to remove. Roots are not nearly as strong and tenacious when they are young.
- Not all weeds are bad. Some are simply where they don’t belong–such as grass or henbit in the flowerbed, or a computer game when a job awaits.
- Weeds are thieves. They compete for nutrients, sun, and space—or for time, attention, and energy.
- Weeds become entangled with the desirable plants, stealing and distracting from their function and beauty.
- If you break weeds off instead of uprooting them, they quickly reappear. Meanwhile, their roots become more entrenched.
- Leave them untended long enough, and weeds multiply, increasing the effort needed to clean them out.
- It’s easier to pull up weeds if the soil is moist—or when we are enjoying rich fellowship and communion with the Lord.
- It’s hard to see all the weeds in the first attack. When you come back to apply mulch, expect to find some that were missed. Getting them all out is often a process that takes time.
- Mulching desirable plants offers protection from weeds and encourages growth. Likewise close fellowship with other believers is stimulating to our growth in the Lord.
- Neglected gardens are quickly choked with weeds.
- Weeds don’t pull themselves. Flowerbeds don’t rid themselves of weeds. The gardner does the work. Likewise, we need to call on the Gardner, the Vinedresser, to rid our hearts and lives of weeds. Self-effort is often not up to the task.
- Once the weeds are gone, the flowers are much more beautiful to behold.
It’s easy to let issues slide, because we like to pursue the things that please us. But as we do, we allow them get more and more entrenched in our lives. Consequently, our lives become more about what we want and less about the purposes of God
But life isn’t about us, it’s about our Creator and what He made us for and called us to. Weeds rob us of God’s best for us, and they rob our fruitfulness for His kingdom.
Jesus said, “You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain . . .” (John 15:16).
As I pulled the weeds out of the daffodil beds, so it
would be pleasing to me and for those who passed, I was reminded of my need to clean the weeds my of my life–so I would be pleasing to the Lord and be available for His service.
Weeding daffodils convicted me. I want to be free from distractions and encumbrances. Freed for fellowship with and service for God. It’s time to pull weeds. What about you?
prison, they are not yet free. They continue to live in bondage. At least that’s what Quovadis Marshall said at the conference of the International Coalition of Prison Evangelists (COPE) in Indianapolis. He has a point.