C is for CUCUMBER

OK I know this isn't much to gripe about but after all the effort, I'm left with just one cucumber. Four months of sowing seed, waiting, watering, transplanting, more waiting, more watering, more transplanting, even more waiting and watering, reading all the gardening guides online, following instructions to the last letter, watching those little yellow flowers form and eventually disappear, leaving behind what looks like a mini fruit and then finding that a month later that mini fruit is still just a mini fruit. And it happened again and again to almost every flower on every plant. By the end I had about a dozen plants, winding their way up bamboo canes, all looking perfectly healthy and green, flowering abundantly and it looked like I was in for a bumper harvest. But it never came. Too often the expected cucumber just became shrivelled and died. I read somewhere that maybe it was a pollination problem, that perhaps the pollen had been washed away during watering but I was never really sure. Anyway I kept tending the plants but they kept failing to produce. Except for one. And it made me so proud. Partly because I had managed to grow a cucumber against all the odds but partly because that one plant had delivered. I don't really think I made much difference in the end, but at least I didn't give up.

And then I thought about that parable Jesus told about the shepherd leaving ninety nine sheep all alone to go and search for the one that had got lost and how much he had rejoiced when he found it and brought it home. And I suddenly realised that my rejoicing over one cucmber growing is nothing compared to the joy that fills our Lord when He finds one soul that is lost and brings them home. I'm so glad He doesn't give up on us.

S is for SEEDS

My dad had a vegetable garden that you could reach along a narrow path from our house. The path was little more than a strip of grass, no more than two feet wide, that had been mown during the weekly lawn cutting exercise and so allowed easy access across a patch of part orchard, part scrub land that stretched to the boundary of the homestead. As soon as the longer nights began to appear, he could be found on many evenings, toiling away with a spade and grape, breaking up the soil from the previous year, adding some farmyard manure and eventually producing ten or twelve long drills into which a variety of seeds would be sown. Thus, by the time of the longest day, we were already sampling such delights as beans, peas, lettuce, scallions, cabbages and a few other miscellaneous vegetables that seemed to appear overnight but actually took months of preparation and care to produce. Maybe it just appeared that way because I didn't visit the garden too often!

And maybe that whole picture was somewhere in the back of my mind when the longer spring nights heralded a new growing season this year and my mind turned to all things green and edible that might be grown in the comforting and immediate locality of our back yard. And so it was, armed with a few seed trays, some small bags of compost and a bundled pack of assorted seeds that the whole growing process began to reenact the history of my childhood. You know I've always wondered why garden centres sell bundled packs of seeds that altogether cost less than the price of a single packet. It's like buying a value pack in a supermarket but I can't help thinking that there must be something wrong with the seeds to sell them so cheaply. Maybe they won't germinate or maybe it's just a ploy to get more people interested in growing plants. Anyhow, after several days in the warmth of a conservatory, the green shoots appearing proved that I need not have worried and soon it was time to transplant into containers that could cope with the future extensive root systems that had been planned. And so it went on, beginning with chives, lettuce, tomatoes, beetroot and even cucumber seeds and a couple of small 'plastic' mini greenhouses, I watched enthralled, as the little seeds I planted in April began to emerge into fully grown plants that by now are several feet tall in the case of the tomatoes and cucumbers and some, such as lettuce and chives have already made it into the summer salads. Just a few weeks ago small tomatoes began to emerge from the remains of the flowers and more recently a fairly large cucumber is rapidly taking over one of the mini greenhouses and just pleading to be eaten. Indeed the whole back paved areas is awash with green colour and edible plants providing a nice contrast to the many pots of colourful flowers that wife spreads around the outskirts of the homestead. And all produced from a few packets of seeds.

It's at times like this that I'm humbled by the Creator and His magnificent creation, His planning on how it all fits together and His infinite intelligence that creates a myriad of different plants from tiny seeds, some of which we can eat and others which just bring a dash of colour to our lives. And I'm humbled that amidst all this creation that I can see, He also created me and gave me the ability to think, talk and appreciate who He is and what He has done. But I'm also reminded of the great commission to tell the world of the Gospel, to 'sow the seed' and the responsibility that falls on every believer's head to spread that seed. How often I have failed to take opportunities to further the Master's kingdom and sometimes maybe i just didn't think the seed was precious enough. But when you realise that the seed you sow can give life for ever it sort of helps you to prioritise your life and everything else seems so much less important.

You know I've made mistakes in my gardening career. Sometimes I didn't read the instructions properly, sometimes I forgot to water, other times I watered too much but almost always the seeds germinated anyway. And you see, it is God who brings the harvest, not us, but above all we must, even in our imperfections be obedient and faithful and sow the seed.

Just a word of warning if the seed has already been sown in your heart. This year I planted some lettuce seedlings in a old length of spouting. Initially they grew well but within a few days they were all gone, courtesy of the greedy mouths of rabbits and birds. Jesus told a parable about such seed being sown in different places in Matthew 13 with varying degrees of success. Let me ask you, what is it that stops the seed growing in your life?

D is for DONKEY

Donkeys gets a bad press sometimes and possibly not always without some basis for that criticism. They've crossed my path on many occasions and enough instances are memorable enough to be recorded in the annals of my own personal history. We had a favourite Christmas single at home, called 'Little Donkey' sung by, I think, Nina and Frederick and describing the journey of Mary and Joseph to Bethlehem. I don't recall it occurring to me at the time that there is no mention of a donkey in the biblical Christmas story but I liked the melody anyway. I guess what more stands out in my head are the local sayings that are imprinted in my mind, such as 'I could eat the cross off a donkey' or 'flap you ears and pull like a donkey.' Less memorable were those occasions when you could be described as a 'big donkey' or even a 'stupid donkey' though by the very nature of the latter statement, the unsuspecting orator was suggesting that not all donkeys were indeed void of intelligence!

And this of course I know at first hand, having had the unforgettable but not memorable experience of riding a donkey on the beach at Newcastle or being part of a donkey train through the Gap of Dunloe in Killarney. In both situations the four legged creatures were well programmed and highly disciplined, always travelling at a predetermined pace and one soon became aware that the rider had absolutely no control over his legged vehicle and just had to sit there, enjoy the view and suffer the agonies of an uncomfortable bottom, accentuated by every uneven step. Some years ago I was reacquainted with the species when one arrived at the door of my home, close enough to ring the bell and with no obvious reason for being there or indeed leaving. So after some gentle persuasion, for I discovered that little else works in trying to move a donkey, it retreated from the front step and took up residence on the adjacent lawn. Eventually, following another period of discussion, we managed to move it slightly further from the house but never far enough away to be convinced that it wouldn't move closer when we were out of sight, which of course it did. Eventually after some time, days, I think, its rightful owner came and took it away though whether he was glad to be reunited, remained uncertain.

Such thoughts were in my mind as I rummaged through the book of 2nd Kings, reading all about those two great prophets, t he soon to depart Elijah and his understudy Elisha and it was with intrigue that I came across this verse in chapter 6 which stated, 'there was a great famine in Samaria and indeed they besieged it until a donkey's head was sold for eighty shekels of silver.' For people to be reduce to eating such an ignominious part of an animal that they deemed to be unclean and paying the equivalent of two pounds in weight of silver for the 'delicacy' gave some idea of the desperation that the famine was causing, though probably not as much anxiety as the sight of the Syrian army all around the city whose siege had resulted in the famine in the first place. It was Elisha who would predict, by divine guidance, that within a day the famine would be over and the Syrian army would have fled the scene, because of God's intervention and I suppose any remaining donkeys would be safe from the butcher's knife. And of course that is exactly what happened but something else in the story caught my eye. The first men to discover that the enemy had departed hurriedly were four lepers who had previously come to the decision that if they stayed at the city gates they would be killed, if they went inside the city they would die anyway so chose to surrender to the Syrians in the faint hope that they might get some food but knowing that if they should be killed, it was no worse a fate than they already faced. Imagine their shock to see the enemy camp deserted and their surprise to see food, drink, clothing and gold left behind by the fleeing army. But in their joy, they didn't forget the city that they had left and the people perishing inside. They said, 'We are not doing right. This day is a day of good news and we remain silent.' (ch7 v9)

I'm so conscious that we have Good News of Jesus' salvation and yet we remain silent, too eager to fill our lives with things that ultimately will have no value and disappear. I guess it all comes down to what we value the most, our own lives and the material things that we acquire to satisfy us or our Saviour and the spiritual food that is freely available through Him for all who believe. And you see it's not just something He would like us to do, it is our responsibility to not be silent but to tell others of the good things we have found. Remember while we don't, they perish.

In John ch 12 we read, 'Do not be afraid, O Daughter of Zion; see, your king is coming, seated on a donkey's colt.' That much maligned animal was important to Jesus the King of Kings but can He depend on us to carry His cross?

E is for END

Well it's been a long journey. Way back on 29th July last year I wrote my first ever blog about titled A is for APPLES. It was just a few retrospective thoughts on earlier years and the world that I inhabited as a child coupled with a spiritual thought at the end. I suppose the intention was to attract those who had little or no interest in God and maybe just make them stop and think. Slowly, working through the letters of the alphabet, dwelling on those that sparked my recollections most, I tried to bring a relevant and appropriate spiritual dimension each day. I called it 'Growing Seasons' because it took me through the four seasons over many years of physical and spiritual growth and hopefully at times, those who chose to linger, found something to laugh at, cry at or at least ponder over in relation to their own experiences.

And it took dedication, far greater than I imagined at the start, finding a least an hour every day to sit in front of a monitor and create something that at least made sense to me. There were days when the early morning sunrise was my only compatriot, other times when I watched the midnight hour arrive, occasionally after school in the hour before I came home and often in the unlikeliest of places and occasions. There was no rest on school holidays, Christmas Day or New Year's Day. Some were written on a hotel computer in the Algarve, others in Chicago, Kentucky and Washington DC, one even in Heathrow airport and several formulated on a small PDA with a stylus my only finger. Even my birthday was not exempt. At home, sometimes I typed on the house PC and later in the year, as spring arrived, on the laptop at the picnic table. But I wasn't alone. For she who has always been called 'wife', my best friend, was always there, reading and encouraging and what's more, keeping her part of the bargain too by writing her own blog '365blessings' each day. But now it has all come to an end. I have run the race and finished the course and although this blog entry is dated for today, it is in truth for the 28th July and will soon revert to that.

So what have I learned during my year of meanderings, murmurings and memories? I suppose that my memory is not as bad as I though it was and those details that I thought had been lost came flooding back on a regular basis. I learned too that life is really all about a collection of experiences that shape us to be the people we are and even those moments that seem less significant or forgettable have a role to play in our whole understanding of our existence. We are moulded by our past but the clay never dries so there is always room for change. I've also learned that there is nothing that you cannot make time for if you really want to and if it's important enough to you and this blog has fallen into that category. But the thing I've really learned is how little I really know about the God I claim to follow and about what He wants to say to me and how I need to constantly seek a deeper relationship with Him. I've learned how to see God in every situation, not just as a bystander, but as someone who is sovereign and in complete control of every situation in which I have found myself. And a year later, I know that not only is my faith stronger and deeper but He has spoken to others through what I have written, despite my inadequacies.

And so the end has come. It has been a wonderful journey of recollections, observations and discoveries but even as I close, I know that it is not really the end but a new beginning, along another road that will take me even closer into the presence of the God who gave everything for me and chose me, in His grace, to receive the salvation which was purchased for me through His Son. In truth, that road never ends, that story never finishes for when I stand before my Father and He welcomes me into His Kingdom, the journey leads on into eternity and that is for ever. If you also travel that same road, some day our paths will meet and maybe we'll share our memories of an all sufficient Creator as we worship in the all consuming glory of our heavenly Father. If you are standing at the crossroads of you life, hopefully this blog might help you choose your direction wisely so that you may find the God of my faith in your 'growing seasons' and also travel along the road which has no ending. So let's not say goodbye, just Au Revoir.

E is for EARLY

Sam lived a couple of miles across the river from home. I really only knew him well in His late middle age and more senior years but he was still a distant figure in the locality and valued his privacy in the back pew at church. He was a farmer along with his brother, having honed his interest, strength and skills through the years when the work was more dependent on man than machine but now life was taken at a more leisurely pace and the urgency to complete tasks was less prevalent. Still, everything he intended to do was done, it just took a little longer. Sam was a morning person. By the time I would be getting up for school, he would be arriving into the family kitchen for breakfast with his brother and sister, having risen several hours earlier to bring in the cows and do the milking and any other tasks he could find around the yard. Like his two siblings in the house, he had never married and he was a man of few words, but mostly wise ones, finding his contentment in the things of creation around him and a simple faith in his Creator. I doubt if he bothered much with evenings, except on the few occasions when visitors, such as my dad, would arrive on the occasional Saturday night and they would all sit around an open turf fire to discuss the news of the countryside. Generally, we are not a nation of early risers, compared to, for example, America, where I was reminded again this summer that nine o'clock in the morning makes you late for everything!

One year, when I was twelve or thirteen, the powers that be decided to forego the traditional ritual of turning the clock back in winter so that we had British Summer Time all the year round, even if in those days, you could distinguish the seasons. It meant that we went to school in the dark but had a longer daylight in the evening. I loved the early mornings because dad used to give me a lift into school in town when he was going to feed his cattle and I would arrive at least half an hour before anybody else. It was the most peaceful time of the day, sitting around in the class bay with only the overhead fluorescent lights for company, along with my thoughts for the classes ahead and thew silence of the empty corridors. But alas, such moments are short lived and slowly, other pupils filtered in from the highways and byways and the peace I knew was eroded for ever, or at least until the next morning. However, I never forgot the importance of those moments and even today, there is nothing more pleasant than an early morning walk or just time alone before the sparrows' alarm clocks herald a new dawn. That is also the time when I believe I find the greatest opportunity to be alone with God and to listen for His voice as I read His Word.

One of the common phrases in the Old Testament is 'early the next morning' and what usually follows is some definite action related to the faith of the person involved. So men like Abraham, Jacob, Moses, Joshua, Gideon, Samuel and David all rose in the early hours to strengthen their faith, to accomplish God's plan and also to praise God for His faithfulness. Mark also records that 'Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed' while John reminds us that 'Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the entrance.' Starting the day with God is the common denominator, where our first thoughts help to shape our day and keep us in communion with him as we make decisions and interact with others.

Here's a final thought. A few weeks ago we went to a church in Kentucky. We gave ourselves plenty of time for the elven o'clock start, arriving thirty minutes early, yet found the car park already well filled. It was clear that something wasn't right in our planning and the notice at the front of the building confirmed our fears for the Sunday morning service had been brought forward by one hour during the summer. If only we had taken the time to find out earlier, we would have been fine. Still, we made it for the sermon, so it wasn't all bad. It's all a matter of preparation and although I'm a reasonable time keeper, I know when I arrive late for anything, I just didn't prepare early enough. And yet we treat God in the same way, not making preparations to be ready for the return of His Son, after which we will be too late. In Matthew 24v36, Jesus says 'No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son,but only the Father.' You can never prepare early enough for that.

E is for EASTER

David, a good friend of mine, preached two sermons last year on what he called 'The Promise'. Based on the Genesis 3 account of The Fall, he highlighted, in particular verse 15, where God, speaking to the Satan, disguised as a serpent, says 'And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.' His first talk, preached just a few days before Christmas Day, outlined that in these words, God was promising some day that a direct descendant of the woman and hence God, would be at war with the devil but would ultimately triumph and how the Old Testament reveals the path and lineage towards that person who would be born in a stable in Bethlehem, so fulfilling the first part of His promise. In the second instalment on Good Friday, we were taken to the cross and then the empty tomb where, through His death and resurrection, Jesus, son of God and Son of Man would crush for ever the power of Satan by defeating His ultimate weapon, death. In so doing, He also opened up a way for man to be reunited to God and to once again realise the purpose for which he was created, to worship His Creator and not His creation. That essentially is the story of Easter, some forty days after the Christian festival of Lent, forty days prior to Ascension and fifty days before we remember Pentecost and the coming of the Holy Spirit. And that is, as David says, 'The promise'.

In the church of my childhood, I always remember the Good Friday services for no other reason than the solemnity of the occasion. I used to think, 'why are you guys all acting so sad? Unlike the disciples, in the infancy of their faith, you know that Easter Sunday is coming.' It really was surreal to see everyone going around with such morose faces, yet safe in the knowledge that the Resurrection had secured their eternity with God. And while I understand the magnitude of God's grace and love in the gift of His only Son and the horror of His final hours and death, I realise why it had to happen, for without our Good Friday, there can be no Easter Sunday, just as without that first Christmas, there would never have been an Easter. What a plan! What a promise! God in human form, sinless perfection, entering the world through the miracle of the virgin birth and as the Son of the Trinity, taking the punishment I deserve for all the sins I ever have or will commit, dying and rising to overcome what should have been my just desserts, that is death and in so doing, defeating the power of the devil over me. And after returning to His Father, I find that I am never alone because another person, the Holy Spirit, is sent to become the heart of my very existence.

There are many parts to the Easter story. In school, I composed some music to represent each piece so that, Palm Sunday had triumphant melodies while Good Friday was melancholic and Easter Sunday, the sounds of a new dawn. The Betrayal was dark and sinister, the denial section of question and answers using two different instruments and the Ascension, an angelic section slowly becoming higher in pitch. The kid's job was to try to pair each section with the correct part of the story. The only drawback is that they needed to know the whole story to understand the moods associated with each part and everyone didn't have a good grasp of that. Perhaps my childhood church could have helped! Maybe the trouble is that so many now associate Easter more with hot cross buns, holidays, Easter eggs and cards in the same way that Christmas has become a festival of commercialism and activities that require no thought of 'The promise' We need to reflect on the words of Isaiah who writes in chapter 7v14 'Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel,' the essence of the Christmas Story and in chapter 53 v 5 'he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed,' why God must be always central to our Easter.

'The Promise'. Started and finished in an earthly Garden but made in heaven and completed when Jesus comes to bring all who believe, home to perfect unity with His Father. Let the story and message of Easter never become dim or lost in our generations or in our hearts. Roll the stone of unbelief away.

E is for ECHO

The plan was simple and straight forward. We would drive to a town in the van, park somewhere close to the centre, unload the sound gear and musical equipment and, hopefully, within half an hour would be singing and playing to anyone who wanted to listen. It was the brainchild of the organiser, Pastor Robert Dunlop, who had invited us down for the fortnight to work alongside and also separate from the Youth outreach team that had been drawn from churches all over the province. His church was in County Kildare, in a small, picturesque village called Brannockstown, but our base was to be Courtown harbour, a little seaside village that took life at a sleepier pace than the larger towns in the vicinity. And while the youth team spent their days holding kid's club sand other activities locally, our remit was to be ready every day to take the roadshow to a different location, sometimes managing to fit in two different towns in the one afternoon, before returning to the small harbour village in time for the evening session. And so, over the two weeks we seemed to cover almost every town in that bottom right hand corner of the island, from Wicklow to Waterford and a few other smaller villages besides. It was a wonderful experience. Soon after we would arrive at our destination, the locals, intrigued by our presence and the gear we were unloading, would start to congregate at a safe distance and because we had trimmed down the equipment to the essentials, in a short time, we were ready to start. Except, of course, for one thing. Power! Yes we needed power from somewhere. There is little point in having all the right sound gear but no power to drive it. And that's exactly where Pastor Dunlop came in. In every town, shortly after we arrived and had decided an appropriate location, he would disappear with a long cable and within minutes would return with the good news that a local shop owner had allowed him to 'plug in', free of charge, for the duration of our stay.

So how did he do it? I've no doubt that God was in control of the whole event but Robert was an important and indeed vital instrument in His hands. For a start he was never afraid to go and ask for power and if refused, was quite happy to keep trying until a source was found. Also, being from the same region, his accent posed less of a threat than our 'foreign' tongues from much further north and his understanding and use of regional colloquialisms certainly found warmth in local people's hearts. But I think his greatest attribute was that he was well known throughout the whole areas and commanded great respect from all sections of the community, regardless of their religion or race. Much of that regard probably came from his overt witness of his Saviour through the Churchmobile, a bus which he had obtained several years previously and which he had converted into a little church on wheels, with room for about forty people. From the outside it looked like a church, with painted on arched windows and a spire that could be lowered while in transit and it was parked every evening at Courtown harbour during the evening gathering. Anyway, the format was simple. We sang for roughly forty five minutes, songs and hymns being interspersed with a few words from Robert and then, towards the close he would preach for a short while. People used to gather in large numbers when they heard the noise and of course while the words we sang prepared their hearts, Pastor Dunlop watched from the side and had discerned his audience well before he even rose to speak. But what I will always remember was the strange echo in many of the towns as our singing and his preaching bounced off the buildings on the opposite side of the street and came back to meet us a fraction of a second later. It was just like singing in a big room and we knew that everything said and sung had echoed all the way along the street in both directions.

As I think of those wonderful days, many years ago and remember Robert, just recently retired from his church in Brannockstown, I am also reminded of the words of God through the prophet Isaiah which say 'So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.' Hundreds of people would hear the Gospel of Salvation those two weeks and while I never heard of the effect it had on anyone's life, I know that God's words went out for a purpose that He had ordained from the beginning of time. Yet I am also reminded of the need for perseverance, the kind of which Robert always showed and of course how little we can actually do without that great source of power that is only found in Jesus. He tells His disciples, just before returning to His Father, 'But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.' And isn't that the key, for without that power in our lives, we can be of little use even at home let alone in work, school or as missionaries in a far off country. But when we have His power, what else can we do but echo His love and grace to everyone we meet.