Are you getting tired of Blackberries yet?

Good morning,
I pray that the day is finding you well.

As I was writing yesterday’s bread thought life came to mind. This is what I was thinking.

When we started cutting back the Blackberries all we could see was this jumbled mess of vines and thorns, but as we cut them back other things started to emerge. We began to see little gifts that where buried by the vines and thorns.

I mentioned before that neighbors and community folk began to take notice of our work and stop by. Children came over and at first were just watching us and then began to help us in our/their project. They would help clear things, move things, and generally lift our spirits by just being there.

As patches of ground would come into the light for the first time in a long time we would find treasures that were lost long ago, nothing of real value, at least in the eyes of the adults; nothing of value if you are looking for gold and silver (earthly treasures). First an old football was released from it’s prison, then a soccer ball came into view, we found ten baseballs under the thorns and the vines.

The kids looked at these gifts with wide eyes and amazement. They started to play with the balls. They were reveling in the sheer enjoyment of finding things that were once lost and now are found. I started watching these kids that were having a wonderful time “playing.”

Thought life can be like these Blackberry bushes. A negative thought can emerge, small enough in the beginning. It can grow, taking over small parts of the garden that is your mind, never realizing that it is encroaching on your other thoughts. Left unchecked these earthly thoughts can and will take over your entire minds garden. They can overgrow and bury your good thoughts, the ones you treasure, imprisoning them until they become out of sight. You’ve heard the term, “Out of sight, out of mind.” Hmm.

The beautiful thing about weeding is that once you have cut away all the thorns and trimmed the plants so that they are working with you, not against you, you begin to see things differently. You begin to see the beauty that God intended you to see. Cutting back the Blackberries allowed me to see the joy of a child’s play, the smile on their face, hear the laughter in their voice. When we began cutting we didn’t know what we would find, and frankly we didn’t “think” too much about it. It is truly amazing what God can reveal when we cut back our weeds in our minds garden.

I am reminded of something Martin Luther once said, he said:
“Thoughts are like birds. You can’t stop a bird from flying over your head, but you can sure keep it from making a nest in you hair.”

You may not be able to keep a fleeting thought from entering your head, but you sure can keep it from taking root and growing.

This brings me to Paul who said:
Colossians 3:1 Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things.

Thought life, are we weeding our garden?

Something to think about.

Blessings,