Do You Tend To God’s Garden?
I received this email from a member named Tom. I wanted to share this with you
Pastor Bob, I am a general contractor and my lead man is …..a Mormon. He has experienced a rash of untimely and extremely costly (and unfortunate) events the last 6 months. He is a Mexican national and has worked for me for over 2 and 1/2 years. He is a wonderful, honest and forthright young man.
Each time life has dealt him some small catastrophe he has come to me for help. He has sent more than $50,000 back to his home and mother in Mexico city during his stay here. This money was to build a print shop as he is a trained graphic artist. Last week he found that there is no money left and there never was a print shop being built.
This was the final straw in a series of financially ruinous episodes which included accidents with uninsured motorists (2), mechanical breakdowns, tow costs impounds, citations and the court system which charged my friend for citations which they said had been issued to his wife, he has never married. Today he told me that he was on medication for depression and he could not sleep due to the pressure of all that has happened these last 6 months. I asked him if he was seeking consolation from his church and he told me that his feelings toward God were not what they had once been and that he had asked God for assistance many times throughout these terrible times, to no avail.
I asked him if he had been to any services or if he had even spoken with God at all recently and he said “No, not really.” So I asked him if he really wanted any help and he looked at me like I was crazy and he said “Of course I do!” Well, I said you need to ask God for forgiveness. He said, “For what?” and I said, for not having the faith needed or even believing in His word. I said, if you were a farmer and you planted a couple seeds then ran off to town for a couple of months to do whatever and came back to the farm to reap the plenty what would you really expect? He looked down at his shoes.
I told him that he needs to plant his seeds and tend his garden with care and with expectations of plenty because he will get from it what he puts into it. If the crop fails he needs to plant again and work the soil, weed and water and expect (have faith) his toils to pay off. Most of us are spiritual wimps. At the first signs of failure we give up. We are all too short-sighted and we expect constant gratification without sacrifice.
I’m not sure if this talk will have any effect on him in the final analysis but I did mention that my church has a Hispanic congregation and that he would find our members all caring and supportive.
April 8th, 2008 at 11:06 pm
Common reaction of someone who expects to reap a lot without doing a lot. Common mistakes of people thinking that a follow through is never really necessary because of so much trust and confidence expected from them, which is sometimes good but in another way ends up frustrating because too much expectations most of the time meant to be to other way around. However, Maybe if things have been that way, maybe its a message that needs some attention, Spiritually? difenetelly yes. Sometimes it takes for us to fell down before we realize what causes it , but most of the time its never too late to get up and keep going.