Lent day 4 Weeds

Yesterday Mum asked Ben and I if we would do some weeding in her front garden.  She has a path leading from the road to her front door which is set with small paving slabs and two raised flower beds either side.  She has been away over the winter and only came back a couple of weeks ago, and because nobody has been walking over the path the weeds have come up and gone a bit mad.   So Ben and I went out with kitchen knives and dug down in the tiny crevices between the slabs to root out the weeds.  Some came out easily, the dandelions however......

After a good half hour or so we had got every last trace of illegal foliage uprooted and I suggested to Mum that we buy a bag of cement to brush into the spaces so that there is less chance of the weeds coming back.  Because they will come back. There is nothing more persistent than a weed!

And I suppose that's the short and sweet lesson for today.  It isn't just enough to uproot the weeds.  We have to make sure that there is no fertile ground for them to re-seed into.   Which might seem like a contradiction because Jesus tells us that we need to be good soil so that we can grow a harvest of the Word he sows in us.   But in the parable of the sower Jesus points out that the soil in which weeds grow is the soil of worry and of wealth.

 22 The seed falling among the thorns refers to someone who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, making it unfruitful ( Matt 13)

So when we worry or when we put our trust in worldly wealth and our own efforts to provide for our own needs then we are furnishing the enemy with soil in which he can plant his weeds.   Worry is the scourge of our age.  If you are a worrier - then stop it!!  Seriously.  Don't.  Worry chokes and strangles the promises of God.  Get rid of the weeds and then concrete over that ground for good so that the weeds cant come back.  

Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life? Matt 6;27

Ha!  I wasnt going to write any of that when I sat down at the laptop tonight!  Funny how this blogging thing works.   Now to listen to my own advice

Happy weeding folks