Fruitfulness in brokenness

Lessons from a tomato plant.

I don't grow  plants.  I kill them. Always.

Except this year.  My daughter planted some tomato seeds (SEEDS!!) in April and they have now grown into a huge plant. I still can't quite believe it's happened.

I have three theories why these seeds have survived:

1) Music.  They are by the piano and have thrived on the beautiful music made by my children's piano practice. (Hmmm)

2) Piano practice.  They have thrived because I sit with each of my children for 5 minutes each morning to get them to do their piano practice. During this 5 minutes I notice the plant and remember it needs watering.  I go and do it while they play one of their pieces.

3) The trough has a special tray to catch the extra water at the bottom so this means that I have not drowned the plant by over watering. :-)

Here is the proof I'm not lying:

The seedlings in the tray. We were supposed to be seeing the difference the greenhouse thing made.

Us planting them from the tray into the big green trough. What a stylish mum I am!

 In place on the windowsill.  Don't ask me about the pumpkin, cucumber and carrot plants.  We're not going there.


ANYWAY, this is meant to be about what I learned from my tomato plant.  You see one day, I accidentally snapped one of the branches. By the end of the day the leaves had all withered. I was amazed at how quickly the branch dried up.  

I reflected on how we need to keep constantly connected to the Lord and how quickly we 'dry up' spiritually if we lose that connection. I thought how that branch would never bear fruit and how in order to be fruitful I need to keep receiving from God.  'I must write a blog about that' I thought. But this is not THAT blog.

I told my husband and showed him what had happened.  He took a stick and some twine.  He took some cling film and he propped that branch back up and wrapped cling film round the break.

I was sceptical.

But guess what happened?

Look!  There are TOMATOES on the other side of that break.  I have now eaten one of those tomatoes and it was yummy.

Then God spoke to me about His redemptive power to bind up the weak and the broken and His ability to still bring fruit in their lives.

So often I think God can't use me because of my brokenness and sin.  But it's not true.  Even when I've broken connection with Him, I can come back.  He gently binds up my wounds. He continues to pour His love and grace into me.  And if I can just stay connected to Him, He WILL produce fruit in my life.

How amazing is that?!

I praise you God that no one is beyond Your redemptive power to restore and that You can bring fruit in our lives even in the broken places.  Amen.