It is the spring of the year and the plant and flower industry is 
in full bloom. It is easy to come away from the store with the added baggage of a flower or two. Some will last only a season, and others will come back next year if we are willing to expend the energy to put them in the ground and take care of them. It seems that each year at least one new flower bed is made at our place, and this year is no exception. Barb is a highly proficient bargain spotter, and when she came across some good-looking lilies marked down to only a dollar a piece, we became the proud new owners of six oriental lilies. When I was informed of all the abundance of beautiful flowers and good looking plants at that store, and that I really needed to see them, of course, I was ready to go see for myself. So in order to incorporate those six bargain lilies into the landscape, at the store we saw some phlox and some petunias, and it all began to materialize. We could put a new bed by that blank shed wall with a row of the orange lilies along the back, which will grow 2 or 3 feet tall. Next we could put a row of the light purple phlox, which will grow about 18 inches tall. Then we could put an assortment of the white, purple, and reddish colored petunias that grow about 12 inches tall all across the front and fill in some blank spaces. So that bargain of six dollars of beauty was transformed into some amount of double digits of beauty. Plus we get to break up some new ground with the shovel, add some soil amendments, mix it all up real good to make a top notch bedding soil, and get our new plants in the ground in a brand new bed. That’s OK. I believe that is why God put the first family he created in a beautiful garden. He wants us to be together with him in his presence and together enjoy the beauty of his creation. That’s the way he started it all in a garden (Genesis 1-3), and that is the way it is to continue. When sin came in to destroy that beauty, he made provisions through his Son, Jesus Christ, and the sacrifice of his life, to put it all back together again. He came to give life and life more abundantly. Bad choices in line with the enemy’s deceptive plan of destruction can ruin it all. But choices made to embrace and line up to God’s plan of life in Christ Jesus is a beauty beyond description. We can enjoy God’s beauty in God’s garden, if we will. It is being willing to exchange our life for his: “Lord, I give you my life, and I receive yours.” In that garden the roses never fade.
God’s Garden
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