"A little bit of dirt in the right hands!"

I've been staring at my backyard a lot this winter, anticipating getting my garden going again, which I started last year for the first time.  It's a pretty incredible and religious experience to watch food literally come out of dirt!  Above are a couple shots of my garden from last year when it was looking like a lush tropical oasis!  It's pretty interesting however, to look at it now.  What only a few months ago was a thriving garden, is just a bunch of dirt in a box.  There is absolutely nothing lush or remotely tropical going on, just dirt.

The only thing that makes that 8x4 box of dirt more than a box of dirt is the seed, sun, water and time spent weeding and fertilizing.  Without it, either nothing grows, or whatever tries to grow withers away.

We are no different than a box of dirt.  God can take what seems to be lifeless, fruitless, and ordinary and turn it into a lush productive oasis.  There are so many references in scripture where God refers to himself as a gardener.  If we don't allow ourselves to be pruned by Him, we will no doubt wither away.  But if we allow ourselves to be watered and nurtured there is no limit to what we can become.

There were several days where I went out and notice a tomato plant or two had gotten too heavy to hold itself up, or had begun to lean to the side.  It wasn't the end of the world, it just simply needed a stake to hold into place and to guide it upwards.

There is a certain stigma attached to the word dirt "Girl, what happened?  Give me the DIRT!"  Or we talk about people having a dirty mouth, or a dirty mind.  Usually any phrase that has the word dirt in it is being used negatively.

But when I think about dirt, I think about potential.  Maybe I'm not there yet, but I can be, if I'm in the right hands.

I love the story in John 9 where Jesus heals a blind man:

As he went along, he saw a man blind from birth. His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” “Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” said Jesus, “but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him. As long as it is day, we must do the works of him who sent me. Night is coming, when no one can work. While I am in the world, I am the light of the world.”  After saying this, he spit on the ground, made some mud with the saliva, and put it on the man’s eyes. “Go,” he told him, “wash in the Pool of Siloam”. So the man went and washed, and came home seeing.  His neighbors and those who had formerly seen him begging asked, “Isn’t this the same man who used to sit and beg?” Some claimed that he was.Others said, “No, he only looks like him.”  But he himself insisted, “I am the man.”  “How then were your eyes opened?” they asked.  He replied, “The man they call Jesus made some mud and put it on my eyes. He told me to go to Siloam and wash. So I went and washed, and then I could see.”

It's amazing to me to see what can happen in a life with a little bit of dirt in the right hands.