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It
had to happen. After years of fighting it, I’ve finally given in to the
inevitable; I am becoming my parents!
The
warning signs have been there for some time. The first came several
years ago when I discovered that after decades of denial, I actually did
like country music!
The
final clincher came just three weeks ago. For as long as I can remember
one of my mum’s greatest regrets has been that neither of her two sons
inherited her love of all things horticultural. Gardens have never
interested me, not even slightly. Even when Rachel, my wife, began to
develop green fingers I resisted. Until three weeks ago, when I suddenly
found myself elbow deep in compost and bark chips and shock horror.... I
loved it!
Now
I’ve got the bug, there’s no going back, and garden centres have now
replaced record shops as my new places of pilgrimage.
I
now understand when people say that they feel closest to God in their
garden. At the risk of sounding like a ‘born-again’ gardener, I now find
digging and planting have a prayerful quality and that gardening itself
has taught me much about my own spiritual journey. It’s no accident
perhaps that these revelations have been revealed to me during the
Easter celebrations. All around us signs of new life are pushing forth
from the ground and budding upon the branches; what seemed dead or
dormant is now exploding with life-force and beauty; a resurrection
indeed! I’ve discovered that one of the most important disciplines any
gardener needs to learn is that of waiting. Gardens don’t just happen
overnight; they take time to mature and develop. And that takes lots of
patience and TLC. It’s exactly the same with the garden that is our
soul; the deepest wisdom and beauty often only come through the times of
waiting.
Gardens evolve with the seasons and so it is with our souls. They
experience their own seasons, or as some have said their own Easter
cycles. There are for all of us Good Fridays of doubt and turmoil. At
other times we identify more with the joy and clarity of Easter day, but
for most of us, most the time, we find ourselves in-between, in a
Saturday of waiting and hoping. This time can be the most fruitful time;
a gestating time; a time of self discovery.
There is of course one thing for us that is different from that first
Holy Saturday when so many of Jesus’ friends sat in despair and
disillusion. We live post-Resurrection. Jesus is alive. And that same
life-force and power that brought him back from the dead is available to
us too. All he asks is that we begin to cultivate a relationship with
him, the one who himself that first Easter morning got mistaken for a
gardener!
Every Blessing Alan
Priest in charge Hertford St Andrew & Hertingfordbury St
Mary
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