Stones –
My wife and I just finished making a flower bed in front of our house. It is covered in a layer of small white stones and looks much better than the patch of weeds that had been there before. Nothing will grow among the stones, because we dug up the weeds and put a plastic barrier underneath to keep anything from sprouting up. I joked about hoping our “rock garden” would hurry up and grow us some more rocks, but that barely got a smile from my wife.
Why would we put so much effort into a flower bed that couldn’t grow flowers? If we planted flowers in that area, someone (me) would have to pull out the weeds and maintain the plants and replace them when needed. The bed of white stones was much more attractive than the bed of weeds I was never able to keep up with. With all our effort to prevent anything growing, that area is still a flower bed. We placed colorful flower pots on the bed of stones. The pots contain everything the flowers need to grow, are easy to care for and can be replaced as seasons change.
That flower bed made me think of the word GOD plants in us. If the seeds fall on stony ground “they have no root. They believe for a while, but in the time of testing they fall away.” If the seed is planted in weeds, they will be “choked by life’s worries, riches and pleasures, and they do not mature.” The seed that is planted in the flower pots are like “the seed on good soil stands for those with a noble and good heart, who hear the word, retain it, and by persevering produce a crop” (Luke 8:13-15 KJV).
That crop is only made possible by the power of the WORD, the moving of the HOLY SPIRIT and because “God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16 KJV).
Wayne Lance (2017)