cheating seasons

Seasons change: Hot, cold, wet, dry, stop & go.

Today it's 101 degrees. This is what happens to an Azalea bush when the temperature is 101 degrees. OUCH! Don't worry I threw the hose on it.

But today I'm also cheating seasons.

My fall crop of broccoli is growing indoors. It is too hot outside for these cool weather seeds to germinate & grow. Here I have them under a grow light inside A/C-ville.  I'll plant them outside when seasons change to cool. I can extend the cool season further by putting a plastic covering over the plants. Thus, with this greenhouse effect, I cheat the freezing season.

I also plan on harvesting more than once. Once the first brocoli head is ready, I chop it off & the plant will want to shoot up more florettes. Depending on the weather, come fall I may be able to harvest as many as 5-6 times from the same plant (each harvest getting smaller).

This works well with the purpose of broccoli. They want to create seeds so that there will be a next generation of broccoli plants. When they sense the season might change it 'bolts' or starts the seed giving process. I stop the process when I harvest the green florettes before they turn into tiny, pretty flowers. That's why it keeps producing more florettes.

Seasons change.  Hot, cold, stop & go.

But I'm cheating the seasons.

Should I be suffering from horticulture guilt for not letting the poor brocolli plants met their purpose? Maybe I'll think about that when I'm enjoying the tasty brocolli this fall. Maybe not. If I get a yield, I'm pretty sure I'm gonna love the 'fruit' it provides. It's BROCCOLI!

But maybe the question I should ask is what else am I treating like broccoli.

Where else am I cheating seasons? Focusing on the yield & not the life? Striving for the destination & forgetting the journey? Going when it is the season to stop. Talking when it's time to listen? Attempting to blog deeply profound things when its time to teach a kid how to fold laundry? Oh... thats me.... conviction... Hang on.

A few days later:

Inevitably anything cheated of its seasons will fade & droop like the Azalea tree at the top. Yet living in a natural season is strongly resisted in our world. First, we rarely change our bad pattern until we are parched. Second, our solution to the starvation we feel is often to work harder at doing the wrong thing.

Let me explain: An apple tree would look very odd if its roots grow out of the ground & into the very apple it is working to produce. But somehow we've convinced ourselves that our stuff, our products, our ministry, our good deeds can somehow satisfy us.  But Jesus says:

"I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me will not hunger, and he who believes in Me will never thirst."  John 6:35

We can spend a lot of energy pinpointing the specific's of where 'that line is' between sabbath and work; what is meant to be consumed & what is meant to be left to grow future seeds?

But the real question is this:

In what do I trust? Where are my own roots seeking fulfillment?

Do I love the harvest? Or the One who gave the harvest?

Do I value a life that produced much?
or
Do I value a life ABIDING in my maker?

But seek first His kingdom and 

His righteousness, 

and all these things will be added to you.  

Matt 6:33