Pulling Weeds

It’s funny how almost every little thing reminds me of my chickens. No matter which way I turn, it seems, there’s always some special memory that comes to mind. One such memory sprang forth on Monday night, while I was pulling weeds from my flower bed. The chickens used to love getting into the flower bed, and at first, I was real quick to shoo them out. But then I noticed that they were only bothering the weeds… they never touched my plants nor flowers at all. So, of course, I let them do the “weeding” for me. I thanked the Lord for providing for their nutritional needs, and also for saving me from that much work. :)

However, now that those chickens are gone, and I’m too afraid to let my new flock out, I haven’t exactly been thanking God for the weeds, anymore. They’d come up, and I’d hoe… they’d come up, and I’d hoe. An endless cycle, indeed. Yet still, the Lord has blessed it.

As I was hoeing the other night, I noticed that there were a few “new” weeds, that had really taken root. They were stubborn, and I had to exert myself a bit, to get them ripped up. I remember thinking how glad I was to have a good, sharp hoe in hand, for a such a job as this. Had I just been pulling them up by hand, I probably wouldn’t have gotten them at the source.

Then I thought about how very similar this is to the sin in our lives. You see, it isn’t enough just to scrape the surface, in getting rid of it. We have to go deep and pull it up by the root, or else it’s just gonna continue growing, and pretty soon, we’ll begin to see more and more weeds popping up all around it. (Sin begets sin.) And it’s not something we can handle in our own flesh. We need God’s Word… a wonderful tool for going deep and attacking sin at its source. In fact, in Revelation 1:16, we read that it’s a sharp two-edged sword. There is no better “tool” for cleaning sin up at its roots!

I’ve been thinking about my life, and the things I’ve battled in recent months… my own stubborn strongholds. Not “big sins”, like murder or anything. (You know how we Baptists are, always labeling them “big sins” and “little sins”.) But even the “smallest” sins (or what might seem small to us) are still a disgrace to our Heavenly Father. In His eyes, sin is sin. There is no scale that measures one sin from another. Sin is sin. And that’s it.

Whether it be unforgiveness; harboring ill will towards someone; that “little white lie” that only you and the fencepost knows about... it’s all the same to God as if we had killed someone. There’s no difference in His eyes.

As convicting as that is, there is good news. All of those sins (regardless of what label we may choose to place on them) can be forgiven. If we’re a blood-bought child of God, we already know about how His blood washes away our sin. At salvation, we had to confess our sins to Him, and ask Him to forgive us. And He was faithful to do so! We have His Word on it! BUT…

When we commit “new sins” (yes, even those we might not easily classify as sin), we must also confess those to Him… and allow Him to take them from us… by the root. It may be a painful process, sometimes, but if we’re sincere about walking and talking with Him, and having that close relationship with Him, it’s something we must do.

How do we do this??

This is where the two-edged sword comes in. We need it to show us where our failures and shortcomings are, and to strengthen us (spiritually), so that we can live the life that Christ would have us live (by His example). We need it to guard our hearts and to prepare us for the spiritual battles that we face each day… on a personal level, in our families, in our workplace or school. And if you’ve watched the news at all lately, you should know that we, as a country, are in for quite a battle, as this presidential election draws near.

My, my, how we all need to rid our lives of all those stubborn strongholds! Again, we can’t do it in our own flesh. We need that two-edged sword to dig deep and grasp it at the root, so we can go forward in God’s army without that “baggage of sin” weighing us down. We can accomplish so much more for Him if we get rid of that dead weight!

Anyway, it never ceases to amaze me at how God chooses to reveal Himself to us, even in the most unusual of places. It was a two-fold blessing for me, in my flower bed the other night, in that He took my mind off my chickens (my missing them, I mean). But then, too, He reminded me of such a powerful truth. ( I love it when He does that!)

Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and shew thee great
and mighty things, which thou knowest not.
Jeremiah 33:3

I’m so thankful to Him for my salvation, and for the many blessings He’s poured into my life these past 11 years or so, since I came back to Him. I haven’t always made the best choices, nor done exactly as I should have. But each day is a new opportunity to live and do what’s right, according to His Will.

Be blessed! Have a wonderful day in Christ!

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