Newly planted

The garden is here.

Just outside my window, where I always knew it would be. The first time we walked the wooden floors of our home, I approached the large window in the master bedroom and thought, "my desk would go here and my garden would be just outside." And so it is.

I love that I can come to my desk now, ready to write or correspond or relax, and that contentment, color and imagination are just a glance away. I love that each morning I am greeted by the fragrant white blossoms of oleanders beneath the sill. The growing clumps of plumago and durante, tittering away their secrets to the wind, bring a smile to my face and an idea to my mind. They bring more joy and depth and meaning to my everyday life simply by being what they were created to be. What healing simplicity...

The garden has another feature---a beautiful brick walkway. My husband labored for days over it. Carefully plotting and fitting each old Chicago brick into a lovely path with two satisfying curves. He did not have the time or energy for this project, but he did it anyway. He did it for me. I feel blessed to the bone and cherished each time I look at it.

Our garden project should be completed by Christmas. We still have to lay some mulch, place a few borders, finish the final pathways, nail the pickets to the fence and set the gates on their hinges. Then we will be left with the week to week joy of working with our hands and watching the beauty of nature progress. I'll be sure to include a few pictures from time to time.

Now that the garden is well underway I can return to a few tasks that I shelved for a week or two. My quilt is once again in my hands and the basket of gourds and squashes can now meet their soupy fates. Laundry, I salute you. Clean floors, welcome! Freshly baked bread, ah, how we missed you. Mended friendship, I cherish you closer to my heart than ever before.

And finally, I am blessed. Not by any material possession, power or earthly relationship, but by a spreading wealth of love that daily fills me. It is a rich, deep soil. My roots seek to stretch out in His words and anchor my soul in that soil. How painful to think of the tremendous hole my life would bear without Jesus. The place He fills is unfathomably deep, the rift He heals so achingly wide. I am thankful. I rejoice. Wonder of wonders, He loves me, cherishes me and sustains me. In my younger years, I always looked for ways that God could please me. I searched for earmarks of blessing, what did I have or gain that meant God was on my side? I wish I had known then that I had only to look to God for the contentment I longed after. The blessings of the soul are truly greater than any earthly blessing we could find. Our greatest blessing has already been freely given, the sacrifice of Jesus and the payment of his blood for our sins. The greatest debt of all, lifted. May the wandering pilgrims at last lay down their enormous burdens and rejoice.

New showers of mercy are falling afresh upon the newly planted, and we are at peace.