Show and Tell
Have you ever given extra thought to the produce you buy at the market? Specifically, how long it took to reach your hands? Not travel time, but growing time?
Some vegetables, can take close to a year to get from sprout to store. A year! It’s an interesting perspective to keep; how vegetables sold in one season, are usually grown in another.
Farmers plan for this. Home gardeners do, too. They know, if you want tomatoes for summer, they’re planted in spring; If you want onions for spring, they’re planted in fall; If you want pumpkins for fall—they’re planted in summer.
And fruits—that’s a whole other story! Years, upon years earlier, trees set their development.
It’s simply amazing, the timeline it takes for farm to table.
I planted garlic a few days ago.
If you aren’t aware, cloves multiply into bulbs, but won’t be harvested for months to come—early summer, to be exact. I’ve learned I have to sow now, in order to reap later. I’ve listened and watched others how they did it; in order so I could do it. I learned from those who did it before me.
Have you ever given thought to how your faith impacts those coming behind you? How what you are sowing in your soul now, will impact what others will have in their hearts later? How the choices you make in your faith-life now, will establish the faith-walk in theirs, then?
It's an interesting perspective, to keep:
Do you pray openly? Do you give thanks for the bounty you are given? Do you live by the tenets of the Word? Do you set the guiding compass as Jesus, in your home and over your family? Do you show a Savior, over a circumstance?
Do you plant now…for lives, later?
Dear friends, hear me clearly, this isn’t a make-you-feel-bad, conviction post, this is a you-have-incredible-influence, encouragement post. Encouragement in the realm that what you say, and do, and show, and live, now, can set in motion an entire generation’s north star on the One who is worthy! You want an influential life?—you got it right now in your hands!
The day I planted my garlic, I landed on Psalm 78 in my morning time. Coincidence?—I don’t believe in those. Lesson giving?—Most definitely!
Words came to life, as I worked the soil:
"I will utter hidden things, things from old—what we have heard and known, what our fathers have told us. We will not hide them from their children; we will tell the next generation the praiseworthy deeds of the Lord, his power, and the wonders he has done. …so the next generation would know them, even the children yet to be born, and they in turn would tell their children. Then they would put their trust in God and would not forget his deeds but would keep his commands.” Psalm 78:2-6
How incredibly promising! We have a direct part in the lineage of faith. With every ear that hears, and eyes that watch, and hearts that wonder within our influence, you and I have a direct role in future generations!
Do you understand the enormity of this? Our shoulders, are what they need, to stand on for Christ! Our uttering of the gloriousness of God, the Grace that saves, the Mercy that forgives, the Hope that enlightens, and the Word that leads, will impact the children of our children’s, children. It is beyond fathomable, our impact on a future faith-filled world!
You and I are called, friends! Right now. In our everyday, mundane, minutes of our lives, we have a purpose now for a generation we will never see. Those minutes, those moments, those living-then-sharing God-centered lives, to those around us, matter. Because those moments will matter to another’s moments, far ahead of us from now. What we teach and share with those in front us, will impact those in front of them. So, let’s give them Jesus! Let’s give them Hope that matters. Let’s give them a life knowing the God who Saves. Let’s give them the gift of Life. Let’s…“tell of the praiseworthy deeds of the Lord, his power, and the wonders he has done.”
We must. We have a direction. We have a responsibility to those that gave it to us.
Plant your garlic in your lives! Plant what you will not see come up, but what you know will grow. Live for the timeline of Jesus—from heart to soul—not just yours...for theirs, too.
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