Tending the Heart
Good Morning!
Happy Friday to you! I hope you are planning on some sweetness today. It is the beginning of another weekend, and I so enjoy the anticipation that Friday’s hold!
In my excitement this morning I threw open the drapes to find my beautiful blooming garden to have been eaten down to the bare stems last night. Ahhh, I could have cried. My children stared in disbelief as all our hard work in planting, watering, fertilizing and weeding is staring back at us without the beauty of the flowers we were admiring only yesterday. The kicker…it was stormy last night. Those deer they have a lot of nerve. In the midst of a storm decided they needed a quick snack and decided on “Garden A La Croft”.
We are headed over to the nursery to find out if there is anything we can do to salvage what use to be a bright blooming garden. I even put out human hair to keep the deer at bay. Can I tell you I felt a little creepy doing so but it seemed to work…for awhile.
Got me to thinking how my bare, ugly garden is a visual reminder that my heart and mind can become ugly and scarce when I choose to let the business of life take over and chose to not make the time to water and feed my spirit. Reading the words that my precious Jesus wants me to hear has been challenging when my youngest gets up before the birds, my schedule is thrown off and I am feeling the result of not watering and feeding my spirit, my mind, my heart. Without a doubt, my mind was becoming overrun with the weeds of the world.
As I look out from my porch I know my flowers will bloom again because of the magnificents of how the Lord created nature, and in that thought I am reminded through the gentle nudging of the Holy Spirit that my heat and mind can continually be renewed through His power. I do my part…..He is waiting to rejevenate.
I love this verse in these two different translations. The reminder is perfect for today!
Philippians 4:8 (The Message)
8-9Summing it all up, friends, I’d say you’ll do best by filling your minds and meditating on things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious—the best, not the worst; the beautiful, not the ugly; things to praise, not things to curse. Put into practice what you learned from me, what you heard and saw and realized. Do that, and God, who makes everything work together, will work you into his most excellent harmonies.
8Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. (NIV)