“Yard work for the heart”

Jesus doesn’t just wait for catastrophes in our lives to speak to us, however we usually wait until we have a catastrophe before we try to hear from Him. He wants to speak to us in every instance, even when we are doing yard work. Luke 11:10, “For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.”

When I lived in Lafayette, while helping a friend mow the lawn, I started studying the ground below me. Although the grass was bright green, the ground beneath it was uneven and the soil was littered with rocks and trash. The city had recently replaced water pipes in the neighborhood and to fix the mess they made, they literally dumped some dirt and later sprayed rye grass seed. It was a quick fix that required no cultivating or tilling to restore the yard to a workable condition. I was immediately reminded of the parables of the soils Jesus taught in the gospels (see Matthew 13, Mark 4, Luke 8).

Since I’m not a grass “theologian,” I had to look further into the matter. Interestingly enough rye grass is a fill-in for dense (impenetrable) forming sod. It’s a “throw and grow” that can be sown without tilling and without destroying any of the permanent ground covers already in place. It is easily grown in all kinds of soils and climates except the very hot and very cold. It’s good in the cooler weather, but in the summer sun it burns up as quickly as it grew. Most of the time it does not remain long-life but dies out depending on the location and temperature. IT’S A LUKEWARM GRASS! (Check out Revelation 3 to see what Jesus says about being a lukewarm Christian)

Even worse, it’s a Pharisee grass, it looks good on the outside, but underneath it is full of trash. Matthew 23:25-28 "Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean. "Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of dead men's bones and everything unclean. In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness.

Jesus started teaching me about the “soil” of my heart and the “seed” that has been growing there.
When Jesus found me, my heart was full of trashed soil that grew mostly weeds (sin). Like this yard I was mowing, my heart had been a place in need of repair that the world dumped unusable soil onto propagating a garden of iniquity. The Pharisees of the modern day churches threw out lukewarm seed onto my heart telling me I could be a Christian if I believed a certain doctrine and if I followed a set of religious rules. So even though I had the outward appearance of a highly religious person, like this rye grass, these religious rules were just filler seed. Although they sprout fast and looked good, they didn’t change the condition of the heart and when the Son comes out, they will burn up! It wasn’t until I realized that I was going to have to lose the appearance of godliness and actually labor at working the soil that I would reap a harvest of righteousness.

But Praise Be unto God who looked below the dense surface and weeds and saw deeper to soil that was workable! He began to test the soil of my heart to see if it could be made usable. In fact, like “miracle grow” for the heart, I have been born again! 1 Peter 1:23-25, says, “For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God. For, "All men are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field; the grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of the Lord stands forever."

Regularly, we should look to see what has been sown into our hearts and shovel out what doesn’t belong there. If we haven’t tended to our hearts in a while, we need to ask the Holy Spirit to till our hearts and make the soil usable. Then we need to spread the “weed and feed” which is like the very Word of God, and when used properly has the power to get rid of the weeds and cause us to grow spiritually. Like weed eating we need to reach the hidden areas and make the crooked places of our hearts straight. And with daily watering of prayer and worship, God can make the Word richly planted in us grow.

Christ’s yard girl,

Mandy Wakefield