DIG AND DUNG
Yesterday I sat out in my backyard. It was a
beautiful sunny day, quiet and no breeze. Several hummingbirds zipped in and
out, including a Costas (the kind my mom loves). My resident mocking bird sat
on the wire, going through his repertoire of melodies. He even mimics my window
alarms! Bright yellow daffodils and delicious-smelling stock are the first
flowers to bloom this Spring. I love my small garden menagerie.
My garden is mostly low maintenance, but there
are still a few things I need to do to make sure it’s a delight and not a
burden. As I was thinking about what to write today, I thought of an old preach
letter about gardening and thought I’d look it up. It’s got a great message,
and I think you’ll like it.
DIG AND DUNG
God often compares people to trees. And
sometimes, we need to do some spiritual digging and dunging to those trees.
What does that mean? Jesus tells us about this in Luke 13: 6-9:
“He spake also this parable; ‘A certain man
had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came and sought fruit thereon,
and found none.
“Then said he unto the dresser of his
vineyard, Behold, these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and
find none: cut it down; why cumbereth it the ground?’
“And he answering said unto him, ‘Lord, let it
alone this year also, till I shall dig about it, and dung it: And if it bear
fruit, well: and if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down.’”
If our lives are spiritually dull and not
producing the kind of fruit we desire, then it’s probably a good time for us to
do some digging and some dunging.
I have a fig tree in my yard that I’ve had for
24 years. I started off fertilizing it every year, but for the past three years,
when I thought about doing it, I remembered how hard it was to dig up the
ground around the tree to even be able to put some fertilizer in there. After a
while, the ground gets so compacted that it’s a difficult job to put anything
new into it.
That’s how our spiritual lives get
sometimes—compacted and hard. We need to stir things up, breaking up some of
our old ways of thinking and old ways of spending our time. Do we need to ask
some questions as to why we think the way we do? When a person digs around a
tree, he or she aerates the ground and gets things moving. That’s what we need
to do spiritually. Paul tells Timothy:
“Wherefore I put thee in remembrance that thou
stir up the gift of God, which is in thee by the putting on of my hands. For
God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a
sound mind” (2 Tim 1:6-7).
We can never be afraid of digging, stirring
things up a bit. It may be exactly what’s required to get rid of old thinking
and boring, routine patterns.
Then there’s the matter of dunging. I thought
about what it means to dung a tree. Dung is manure, a type of
fertilizer. It’s organic, alive, not watered down, not genetically engineered,
but good, rich, hot manure. The dictionary defines “fertilize” as “to make
fertile; make fruitful or productive; enrich.” Fertilizer is “any material put
on or in the soil to improve the quality or quantity of plant growth.” Fertilizing
gives plants an extra boost.
Often the process of digging and dunging
requires one to get down on their knees. This week I sat down on the ground by
one of my small garden plots and dug out some old dead roots. In their place, I
could see the tips of hyacinths pushing through to the surface. Maybe it’s a
good time to get down on our knees like when we were children and first learned
to pray.
It’s also a good time to give our lives that
extra spiritual boost of the Word of God. The burdens of the world will always
be there. If they are bringing us down, we need some super fuel of what the
Lord is trying to tell us; we need His extra energy to make a positive
difference in our world.
The Lord gives us hope, and He is the
deliverer physically, emotionally and mentally on an individual basis, as well
as the deliverer of nations from an international perspective. Anything on the
international level still begins with the spiritual health of the individual.
Let’s be open to the Lord’s leading, as far as
prayer goes and the sections of scripture He’s guiding us to; maybe a word
study on some issue He wants to help us with? Just think about it and see what
the Lord brings to mind.
How about testing out a new principle like the
laying on of hands for healing, or confronting a devil spirit with the name of
Jesus Christ? Jesus told His disciples to search the scriptures. When was the
last time we dug into the Bible for 20 minutes or so? Whatever we see Jesus do or
any other believer in the Bible do, we can ask the Lord to teach us and help us
to do the same and He will be perfectly willing to help and guide us into it.
There are choices we make every day on how to
spend our time. A good gardener digs and dungs at least once a year. The man in
Jesus’ parable hadn’t done either in three years, so his tree quit producing
fruit. Let’s not be like that. Let’s be diligent in taking great care of our
spiritual gardens, digging out the weeds and fertilizing the blessings God’s
given us.
Love, Carolyn
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