Those came out of my garden yesterday. Usually by now raspberries are long gone, but my bushes are still producing. I’m picking about 2 dozen berries a day, but I think they’re almost totally gone now. It makes me a bit sad…this has been the best year ever for our berries! These last berries have been the biggest, sweetest berries I’ve ever seen!! Apparently, fertilizer, water, weeding, and patience are good for berry plants. And children too. :)
I’ve thought a lot about this since the other day when I grumbled about school. Maybe I’m pushing too hard. Maybe my ‘tough to teach’ child needs less ‘fertilizer’ and ‘water’ and more patience! He needs clear recognition that this is HIS time schedule, and while I do have some things I want to accomplish, it’s not only about meeting my goals or my dreams. I need to remember that this is about making sure this little guy is properly equipped to be all that God has planned for him.
I was stopped in my tracks yesterday as I read through Ecclesiastes 3. Solomon is sharing his observations about time…
There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens:
a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
a time to kill and a time to heal
a time to tear down and a time to build,
a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,
a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.
What do workers gain from their toil? I have seen the burden God has laid on the human race. He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end. I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live. That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil—this is the gift of God.
Wow! Did you catch that? “He has made everything beautiful in its time.” Ummm…okay. I can take a hint. My time schedule on this is clearly not God’s! He promises, though, to take this…this MESS…and make it beautiful!! And how about that other part?? The part that says “I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live. That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil—this is the gift of God.” Hmmm…am I finding satisfaction in all my toil? Definitely not at the moment. Guess it’s time for an attitude adjustment.
Today was a much better school day. I made a few minor changes, and everyone was much happier. Because of the raspberries, I’ve started considering something: that the last of the crop is perhaps the sweetest because it is the most surprising, the most unexpected, the last tangible benefit of the time and effort. And maybe…just maybe that applies at home, too. This ‘last crop’ we’re raising, these little boys God has chosen to bless us with, are an opportunity for us to find satisfaction in the toil. To learn and see and take to heart that only HE makes things beautiful. And that He does it in HIS time. Not mine.
Off to find satisfaction in the toil…and heaven knows there’s plenty of that! :)
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