It was a beautiful day for working outside. I was sitting on a tractor, making planting beds for carrots.
In order to make a straight row, I had to focus on a tree across the valley. The dark evergreen trees that had persevered through the winter to keep the valley pretty were now being complemented by the fresh bright green of deciduous bushes coming back to life.
Then my focus was diverted by the pile of greenhouse materials at the end of the field. My mind started racing through thoughts of what might have been – ambitious plans that I had let die so I could contribute to other people’s plans.
Fortunately, the trees caught my thoughts again. In this part of Canada, there are no evergreens that produce anything worth eating. All the fruit that I enjoy – from the wild saskatoon berries on the hillside to the cherries in the orchard that are loaded with nutrition and flavour – all come from deciduous trees that “die” in the winter.
It’s the same in our lives. Only when we die to self can we bear fruit to God’s glory.
John 12:24, 25
John 3:3
John 15:4,5
Mathew 26:39