Keep Watering Until It Produces

This may have happened to you if you’re a green thumb person. In your flower or vegetable garden, some unidentifiable “gift” started from seed and grew quickly enough that you knew it was not a weed.

Green Thumbers, you have some universal code in cases like this. You don’t pull it. Instead, you see what it becomes.

This happened once in my parents’ flowerbed years ago. What towered through the start of summer became this awesome purple “rocket flower” that would “ooo” and “ah” garden club members near and far. This baby was beautiful.

Now it’s my turn. I think I have three pumpkin plants. Or maybe they’re cucumber. Or maybe they’re squash. I didn’t plant them, but low and behold, early in June, I spotted my gifts and immediately began my care for them. It took me no time to include them in my morning watering routine and with anticipation and a daily smile I wait to see what will happen. Here in mid-July, one bright yellow blossom has become a small green globe.

I know fellow planters…it’s exciting!

Our faith lives should be like this. We just keep watering what will come, even though we have no clue what is exactly growing (or coming our way). We can plan and plan and plan our lives, but, like our gardens, our lives don’t always grow in the direction we’d like them to — if they grow at all. Sometimes we lose what we started. Sometimes we don’t quite get all we thought we would, even after we’ve spent so much care and attention on our desire. And then, like these three plants I have, sometimes something so unexpected comes along.

Just keep watering.

Diana Fuller is doing this not with plants but a scholarship fund. In memory of her parents, Romaine (don’t you be thinking lettuce!) and Betty Salsman, Fuller created a scholarship designed to financially assist area residents interested in earning their General Equivalency Diploma (GED).

Family members say the Salsmans had been impressed when their grandson Cory decided to go for his GED four years after he quit school. Cory met his goal and, with cap and gown, was able to participate in graduating with his class at the Wyalusing Valley High School.

Fuller asked me to include this info, and I’m glad to do so because she’s watering. Those interested in helping this cause can send donations to PO Box 56, Laceyville, PA 18623, or stop in any Community Bank NA location. If you do so, the family asks you to include your address so they can send you a thank you.

Water something—even if you don’t know what it is, where it will go, or what it will become.

We are called to care not figure it out. God’s ways are not our ways (Isaiah 55:8); this is true; but God does give us ways to help others.

Yes, water something. In Galatians 6:9-10, the Apostle Paul writes, “Let’s not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up. So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith.”

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This blog first appeared in The Susquehanna Independent on July 25, 2018.

Pictured: One of the plants. What is it growing?