I have an "almost teen" and in his hardest of hearts, he has pierced my own many a time. Just when I want to push the child away, God says, "This is your opportunity. Draw him near." What can I compare it to... it's like working some of the most dry, barren, infertile, and despairing of lands that you've ever seen. You take a pitchfork with determination and hoe, scrap, dig, and plow with all your might because this is the only soil you have to work with. You fervently push seeds into this unforgiving earth.
However, day after day with blood, sweat, and tears, all your hard work crumbles under the heat of one bad day-- a day when you snap. In one exhausted moment, you begin ripping up all the work that you put into that earth. In a mad rage you tear up what little seeds you managed to plant, banging and scraping against the effort you had given that soil. In one bad day it seems you've ruined any chance of actually witnessing a crop.
Thankfully, the sun goes down, and after a night's sleep, a new day begins, and with it, new mercies. You grieve your mistake, but then with grace, you begin again. Patiently smoothing, covering, and celebrating the land that is for a time in your hands. You see the hardened soil as a welcome challenge to tenderly love with more seeds. Clean the mess. Pack the earth. Plant all you can because you realize something in the newness of the day. Time is not in yours hands. As you quiet your own heart and set your mind to continue, you hear a faint whisper...
"You are not the one who will water this land. You were never meant to water it. You are simply the one called to plant the seeds. But one day this plot of land will move to another. Many other owners will pass through and do their own work on it. Different farmers will water the seeds that you tightly packed into that difficult earth. And then, you'll get a call. 'Come and see. Come and see the plentiful fruit trees that have sprouted and flourished.' Because of so many different hands, working on that stubborn soil, it is now some of the most soft and fertile farmland around. Its fruit is being given to other farmers and spreading a crop farther than you imagined. You were a faithful servant, so there is indeed a harvest from your labor."
So do not give up fellow parent--those with strong-willed plots of land. Do not let your bad day take away from the grace God gives you to start anew. There are seeds you will not water, but they will grow. "Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up." (Galatians 6:9) Some are called to plant, others are called to water, but only God can make our crops grow. (1 Cor. 3:6-8)
~Planting seeds Carefully and Carelessly
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