I have a problem, and that problem is this:
The squirrels keep eating my garden before it can even grow.
Every morning when I let the dog out and go out to check on the garden, there are little holes dug all through it, and a lot of the seeds are missing.
This frustrates me, as you might imagine, but it also makes me think about things. God knew when He created the world that seeds held the power and the promise of new life; this was His plan for perpetuating things, for making sure the earth continues to grow and to be full and to multiply. And yet, he made these creatures that can't seem to stop themselves from digging into the earth and stealing that seed before it even becomes anything at all. While it's just a promise.
I want to talk to the squirrels, to tell them that if they would just have a little patience, that seed would be so much more. It would be a sprout, and then it would be a plant, and then it would bear fruit. If he could just delay his little squirrel gratification for a few short weeks, he could have a feast instead of a snack. He could have not just the promise of life, but life to its fullest (and trust me, the fruit is so much better than the seed).
Then I realized that somewhere along the way, we started snacking on seeds, too. We throw a handful of nuts or seeds into our mouths, and it's the same sort of thing - we eat these things when we're hungry but don't want to wait for a meal. Nobody sits down and has peanuts for dinner. Nobody makes breakfast out of sunflower seeds. They're a snack.
I don't know if we learned it from the squirrel or if that's just who we are, but here we are - snacking on seeds, scarfing down the promise because we have no patience to wait for the fruit.
You know where this is going, at least for now. There are some of us so starving for a chance to live that we'll jump at even the promise of life. Give us just a taste of something good, and we'll snatch it. Give us just a scent of it, and we'll dig up the whole earth to get to it. We don't have time to wait. We're too desperate. So we take it before its time, before God has had a chance to grow it and to mature it and to fulfill it.
And then a few hours later, we realize just how hungry we still are.
I don't know if, like the squirrel, this is just how we're made, or if we've done it to ourselves. I wrote a few weeks ago about how there are things that God desires for me to be that He just can't make me - things like 'patient.' And I don't know if, like the squirrel, I'm just too dumb to think about the promise of the seed or, like a human being, I'm just too hungry.
Did you know squirrels don't even remember where they buried their seeds? They spend all their time burying these seeds so that they have food for later, but when they dig them, they might be the seeds they buried or they might not. Their memories are terrible; it's their sense of smell that guides them to whatever's close at hand.
We're that way, too. We forget the abundant life that we had a day or two ago, or five or ten years ago. Give us a whiff of new life, and we latch onto it. Give us just the hint of a seed, just a taste of the promise, and we will tear things up just to get to it.
It boggles my mind. All this hope, all this promise, all this glory and goodness in the world, and God made creatures that eat...seeds. That are satisfied, at least for awhile, on what is unfulfilled and ultimately, unfulfilling, with all the possibility of a fantastic feast.
It frustrates me when it's the squirrel.
Too often, I don't even notice when it's me.
The squirrels keep eating my garden before it can even grow.
Every morning when I let the dog out and go out to check on the garden, there are little holes dug all through it, and a lot of the seeds are missing.
This frustrates me, as you might imagine, but it also makes me think about things. God knew when He created the world that seeds held the power and the promise of new life; this was His plan for perpetuating things, for making sure the earth continues to grow and to be full and to multiply. And yet, he made these creatures that can't seem to stop themselves from digging into the earth and stealing that seed before it even becomes anything at all. While it's just a promise.
I want to talk to the squirrels, to tell them that if they would just have a little patience, that seed would be so much more. It would be a sprout, and then it would be a plant, and then it would bear fruit. If he could just delay his little squirrel gratification for a few short weeks, he could have a feast instead of a snack. He could have not just the promise of life, but life to its fullest (and trust me, the fruit is so much better than the seed).
Then I realized that somewhere along the way, we started snacking on seeds, too. We throw a handful of nuts or seeds into our mouths, and it's the same sort of thing - we eat these things when we're hungry but don't want to wait for a meal. Nobody sits down and has peanuts for dinner. Nobody makes breakfast out of sunflower seeds. They're a snack.
I don't know if we learned it from the squirrel or if that's just who we are, but here we are - snacking on seeds, scarfing down the promise because we have no patience to wait for the fruit.
You know where this is going, at least for now. There are some of us so starving for a chance to live that we'll jump at even the promise of life. Give us just a taste of something good, and we'll snatch it. Give us just a scent of it, and we'll dig up the whole earth to get to it. We don't have time to wait. We're too desperate. So we take it before its time, before God has had a chance to grow it and to mature it and to fulfill it.
And then a few hours later, we realize just how hungry we still are.
I don't know if, like the squirrel, this is just how we're made, or if we've done it to ourselves. I wrote a few weeks ago about how there are things that God desires for me to be that He just can't make me - things like 'patient.' And I don't know if, like the squirrel, I'm just too dumb to think about the promise of the seed or, like a human being, I'm just too hungry.
Did you know squirrels don't even remember where they buried their seeds? They spend all their time burying these seeds so that they have food for later, but when they dig them, they might be the seeds they buried or they might not. Their memories are terrible; it's their sense of smell that guides them to whatever's close at hand.
We're that way, too. We forget the abundant life that we had a day or two ago, or five or ten years ago. Give us a whiff of new life, and we latch onto it. Give us just the hint of a seed, just a taste of the promise, and we will tear things up just to get to it.
It boggles my mind. All this hope, all this promise, all this glory and goodness in the world, and God made creatures that eat...seeds. That are satisfied, at least for awhile, on what is unfulfilled and ultimately, unfulfilling, with all the possibility of a fantastic feast.
It frustrates me when it's the squirrel.
Too often, I don't even notice when it's me.
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