The Garden

The Garden

What is in the garden of our heart?
That space in the pit of our heart?
That spot can be anything. Anger, resentment, jealously, spite, hatred, strife, blaming, pride, destructiveness, revenge, self-hatred, self-pity, manipulation, controlling, perversion, critical spirit, violence, abusive personality, rebellion, harshness, disobedience, judgmental, fear, self-rejection….Any one of us, who reads this can name at least one of these, that is in our heart.

Guess what…those are bad fruit, rotten fruit. Those kind of fruit, grow deep down with their roots. Intertwining with each other in our hearts. They make the heart hard….the spirit dark.

When you look at a garden…when the soil is fresh, moist, and has plenty of light and water…the plants that grow there flourish, thrive. You see butterflies around and birds near it. Life is drawn to it. Every now and then a rabbit takes refuge there and nibbles on something and you watch it hop away. You admire it. It makes you feel good to look at it and you may think, “Wow, this has really grown nice and big.” “I really enjoy looking at this and being apart of this.”
Beside it, there is another garden. It is dark, hard and has many rocks in it. It is so dry there. Hardly any light is on that area and it doesn’t get any water. Only thistles and weeds are growing out of that ground. There is no life there. Not even a bug or worm is there. They even said, “no thank you, that is no place for me.”
You think to yourself, “That looks so awful, I wonder if I can do anything about it, make it come alive.”
You bend over, reach out your hand and try to pull a few weeds out. You tug and pull and it just will not come up. You then decide, to use both your hands…this time with all your strength, with great effort, a weed pulls out. But you notice, that there are so many roots and you realize those roots are tied in with all the other roots. You may say then, “My God, how will I ever get all this out!”
You then wonder should you just give up on it. It is just too much work.
It is too hard. You can’t do it by yourself.

Here is the difference.
You don’t have to do it by yourself. See the garden is your heart. You do need help to get out all those bad roots. I know someone that can help you.
I had been talking to the Lord about the deep seeded pain and hurts in my life. I wanted to grow closer to my God and I wanted the junk, that bad fruit out of my heart. I wanted the Fruit of the Holy Spirit to be alive within me…but for that to happen the deep roots of the rotten fruit and weeds had to come out first. This was a process for me.
I learned that the rotten fruit and weeds are resentment, hurt, hatred, bitterness, anger, gossip, malice. Etc.
They grow wild and the roots mingle with each other, deep in your heart. How can good fruit grow in that? It can’t. It has to come out. Pulling out weeds hurts. But the results are incredible.

Here is my experience. I had to learn to trust God with my emotions, my thoughts and feelings. He gave all that to me, He created me. I needed to capture my thoughts and forgive. I asked God to please forgive me for harboring and feeding into the weeds in my heart. I asked Him to please help me get that junk out and grow the pretty things of Him instead. I had been used to complaining about my past and recent hurts. I needed to train myself to go to God instead.
So I began this journey.

I was put to the test right away. A person came over and was not kind to me at all. Said very hurtful things, that entered deep into my heart like a shooting dart, tipped with poison. Intentionally to cause pain. Normally my reaction is to go to my room for a few days, with a 2 liter bottle of Coke, 4 or 5 candy bars, (king size), a bag of chips and a pack of cigarettes and cry and cry. Damage upon damage.

At this particular incident, I had a choice. I remembered my conversation with God and I didn’t want this to add another twisted root into my heart.
As this person stood there, waiting for those mean spirited words to take effect in me…With tears building in my eyes, I turned, went straight to my room. I grabbed my Bible on the way. (no food, etc.)
Leaving that person standing there in that hurtful atmosphere and the linger of those hateful words in the air. I went in to my room, shut the door. This time, instead of eating, drinking, smoking and telling myself bad things….I talked to God.
I was crying. I talked to God out loud. “God, did you hear that???? That hurt me. I don’t want it to enter me. I don’t want to dwell on that and make that apart of me. Will you please help me get through this. Please take this hurt from me.”
Then it occurred to me to pray for that person. This was hard to do. Pray for those who hurt me????? I swallowed hard and gave it a try. I didn’t know what to say. I asked God to help with the words. I said, “God, please bless and keep “that person” I feel angry toward “that person” and I don’t want to pray for them. But because it is the right thing to do, from my heart, I ask you to bless them and keep them. That was it and that was all I said in that prayer. But I did it.
A baby step to something bigger.

I felt my heart squeeze with goodness as I prayed. Like bad was squeezing out and it felt plumped up with something good in place. I could actually feel this in me.
I stayed in my room until this person left. Protecting myself from more possible hurt.
Later that week, I was washing dishes and thinking about God. An image came across my mind. Something from my past. Something that I buried deep inside. It came across my mind’s eye like a short movie clip. I could feel the reality of it. The full impact of the emotions and pain it caused me. It took my breath away and I fell to my knees. I cried. God said, “What are you going to do with this Kim?” “Are you going to keep this or give it to me?”
I bowed my head in tears and I said, “God I give this to you, it hurts too much to keep, I want you to take the hurt of this away from me.”
I felt something strange inside my heart, even in the core of me.”
I felt a tingle, and I felt my heart squeeze like before, like something letting go and then plump up. I could fill a release and a fill up.
I knew God was doing this and working on me. I was grateful and thanked God for it. Moments like this went on from time to time and still happen.

God shows me things that need to be out of me and He gives me the choice to hold on to it or let it go. Not every pain has brought me to my knees or to tears. But He is a gentleman and a great healer, full of compassion and love. Sometimes, it is a simple as my saying, “I give that to you God and I forgive.”
Sometimes he shows me things that are so hidden and deep, things I had buried to forget. But even though it is buried deep in me, God doesn’t want it there. He wants to get it all out and not to be a part of me. He loves and cares for me that much.

Pain and hurt, causes a reaction in our personality, it effects how we have relationships, how we conduct our lives daily. We should never live for tomorrow or in the past.
We need to walk in today, in the moment. It is a gift.
God is not, I was or I will be; He is I AM. This is what I am learning. The Holy Spirit guides and directs me. Teaching me and revealing to me the deeps things of God. Drawing me into a love relationship with our Heavenly Father.
I fail…so much…..I fail….But God never fails me.

People can tell me what God thinks, feels and wants from me. I can learn from that…But what I love the most, what I value the most…is when God is in action personally in my life.
It is not always easy, to work on my heart’s garden. In fact, not once has it been easy. God doesn’t play. He gets to it. He is serious about me. He is not superficial or just sitting there with a big stick ready to pound my every fault. I have learned He loves me even in correction. He doesn’t abuse or press me down. He lifts up and draws me close to His side, never letting me go. Unconditional love.

God replaces that bad, rotten fruit with His fruit…The Fruit of the Spirit.
Galatians 5: 22, 23
The Fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, and temperance.
Other good fruit: (some of which are the same as above) kindness, faithfulness, self-control, good works, fruitfulness, forgiving, non-judgmental, accepting, humility, wisdom, servant’s heart, contentment, encourager, happiness, obedience to God’s Word, caring, loves to read and study the Bible, love for the truth, prayerfulness, cheerfulness, strong faith, hopefulness, sweetness, integrity.
For every bad fruit, you and God work on to get out of the garden of your heart…He replaces it with a good fruit.

Try it. Ask God to do this. Be open to His personal, special touch into your heart.
Ask Jesus to open your heart and mind to receive His healing, His love into your life.
Thank Him. No one can do for you like He can. Let Him cradle you close to His side, and tend to the garden of your heart, today.
Kimberly Wenrich


Two Wolves
An old Cherokee Legend
An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life. “A fight is going on inside me,” he said to the boy.
“It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves.
One is evil. He is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.”
He continued, “The other is good. He is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith. The same fight is going on inside you, and inside every other person, too.”
The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grand-father, “Which wolf will win?”
The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed.”

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