As a child one of my enjoyments was working in a garden. My parents loved to garden and it rubbed off on me. At one point I was working for a handicapped man down the street who taught me how to raise vegetables, strawberries and the like. All summer long he sat in a chair at the edge of the garden and coached me. “Put more manure in the base of that hole!” he would shout across the garden. And during that summer I watched magnificent produce come from that garden. Squash and beans and lettuce and spinach. I was amazed as I recalled the seeds that came out of jars from the past year’s harvest. And the strawberries! I would pick quart upon quart and 25¢ a basket just saying “grow!” so that I would receive more money and more work. It didn’t matter how hot it was. It was just an incredible existence. Each day I would head to his little farm, to feed the chickens, pick up eggs and go pick the first strawberries of the day. Later in the summer I would pick vegetables for hours so that he would sell them. Each fall we would collect the leftovers and he and his wife would gather the seeds for the next year’s plantings.

There was much to think about in that garden. Some was spiritual and some was just removing bugs and critters from the garden. Certainly, I did not see the garden as a learning place for me until I grew older.

But in recent years, I have learned the wisdom of putting aside something for the next year. Sometimes money, an item or a thought. While it was not helpful in the winter, it gives me something to hold on to for the next season of my life. Even as I write the words, I am quickened to thoughts I had in an earlier season of my life.

What if my life was that garden? Who would be watching over me. Who would nourish me and feed me and insure my healthiness? Who would see to it that there was a tomorrow? Who would care for the fruitfulness of my life? and what would be the quality of that coming after my own life?

If our lives could be seen as a garden, are they one of health and fruitfulness? What is it I can do in my life to make sure that I remain true to my destiny?

I wrote this short story some 20 years ago. I have come to realize that we are that garden. (1 Corinthians 3:9) Based on that I feel that I am to assemble a number of short stories related to being the life of that garden.

We are best, planted in the seedbed of grace and community.

Lee is on staff with The Village Church in Swanzey New Hampshire.