Note from the author: This post was originally published on March 16, 2012 as a part of a larger series Whining Fast 101 that evolved into Spiritual Formation 101, now tweaked to Spiritual Formation for Dummies. I believe that the truths conveyed in this and subsequent posts are so essential to our healthy spiritual growth and spiritual maturity in Christ that I have decided to repost these entries in sequential order, with heartfelt prayer that the Spirit of Jesus Christ would connect the dots for you and all God's children so that you would be blessed and we all would be empowered by His Holy Spirit to live godly lives of courageous faith and humble service amidst the adulterous, self-serving, wicked and perverse generation among whom we apear as lights in the same world which Christ loved and sacrificed His life for it.
Do all things without grumbling or disputing; so that you will prove yourselves to be blameless and innocent, children of God above reproach in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you appear as lights in the world, holding fast the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I will have reason to glory because I did not run in vain nor toil in vain. Philippians 2:14-16
Now back to the Gardener from Outer Space and his first person singular Dummy...
I am so taken aback by his statement about insipid gardening that the next few days I just follow him around without asking any questions. We pick up broken branches, pull a weed here and a stray crocus there, he replaces the rotten wood and fixes the sagging backyard fence.
We always take a lunch break – after my seven-year long manure fast I find all my taste buds are wide awake and eager to celebrate food in all its flavors, textures and delightful varieties. He asks me to teach him some Serbian phrases, so I make him conjugate verb ishchachkati person, gender, number and tense and threaten to make him go through all seven declensions of the word komarac – singular and plural. We laugh together as he butchers the grammar and pronunciation of my mother tongue. He fails to convince me of the value of country music and we talk politics for hours without getting mad at each other. It feels as if my life has entered some kind of a time warp and I’m shocked to discover that I actually love it. I am getting used to his pace – he is always working, and yet never rushing and somehow always resting. Even though he doesn’t wear a watch, he just knows the right time… for everything. At first it’s really hard to wake up each morning not knowing every dot, ampersand and underscore of my day. But I am learning to wait on his cue. Sometimes they are as subtle as the truckload of manure dumped on my driveway. Other times it’s as loud as the footsteps on the St. Augustine grass.
One day he taps on the window and announces,
National Planting Day! I jump out of bed like a firecracker, decide I don’t need coffee and bolt out of the front door. This is the day I’ve been waiting for! In my book, the sole purpose of gardening is summarized in one word – planting. I hop onto the passenger seat of his white truck and wait for him to fire up the engine. Field-trip to my favorite place on planet Earth – Home Depot!
What are you doing there? He asks, and clarifies it with another question,
Where do you think you are going? I look at him through the rolled-down window, thoroughly confused.
What do you mean, ‘where do you think you are going’? You said it’s the National Planting Day…
Soooo…
Well, we need things to plant. I am getting a little impatient. When I want to plant something, I go to the place where miracles happen every day, THE amazing miracle factory - our neighborhood Home Depot!
He shakes his head and if I didn’t know him, I would think he thinks I am hopeless.
We don’t need to go to Home Depot. We already have everything we need to make your garden a place ‘where miracles happen every day’ – I can’t tell whether he is mocking me or not - right here. With that, he taps his denim shirt pocket.
I squint, still firmly planted in the passenger seat of his white truck, half-expecting to see the blooming perennials in his front pocket.
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