"The Constant Gardener of My Soul"

Today as I was leaving the drive, I marveled at the lush growth of our oak trees. It occurred to me that it pained me to think about having to cut away the growth at the bottom. But in order to encourage them to grow upward and outward, the growth had to be pruned away.

Then I realized something else. We are all like those oak trees. God is our constant Gardener. Without Him, we would not grow. He prunes us, and it is often a painful process. However, it promotes healthy growth of our souls upward and outward.

The upward growth is that which encourages us to reach more toward our Heavenly Father. The outward growth is that which encourages us to grow out ourselves and reaching out more to others. Just like our pruning of our trees is for their betterment, so too is the Gardener's pruning of our souls. We do not prune the trees to bring them harm, and God does not prune our souls to bring them harm.

There are many things in life that bring us pain. There are tough things that we must face. Some of the hardest things we have to endure are events that make us evaluate the status of our souls. The process of evaluating ourselves, painful as it may be, produces growth.

We have all been through times in our lives where we feel we have been put to the test. We have heard the saying :"What doesn't kill you makes you stronger". I now feel that there is more depth to those life changing experiences.

As I look back on all of the pain I endured leading up to and following the big fall out (for lack of a better word), I can now see it as  part of the pruning process. I feel that the event that altered my life was not all on me. But through my struggles, I learned to worry less about others and their wrong doings.

I changed my focus to be on pleasing God not others. If I am doing something for the glory of God, it should not bring harm to others. By doing things with the sole intention of bringing Him glory, I move my focus upward which allows me to reach outward. But oh if you only knew the pain and struggles of the pruning process that brought me to this point.

I sometimes have to revisit the concept of God being the Gardener of my soul. I can ask questions of Him. I can complain at the pain and discomfort of the experiences. But ultimately I have to rely on the fact that God will take those hurtful experiences and use them to shape me into a better person: a better woman, a better wife, a better mother, a better Christian.

I know that God does not cause the events that hurt me. He does not make people do things that bring so much hurt. But as the Gardener of my soul, He takes those painful moments and hurtful things that people have done and uses them as a gardener uses his pruning shears. He cuts away some areas in my soul to allow for my spiritual growth outward and upward. And....despite the discomfort of it sometimes, I am thankful I have a Gardener,  a Constant Tender, of my soul!