Daily Devotion
A Well Tilled Garden
By Cathy Irvin
Have you ever pictured your home as a well tilled garden? Your home, like a garden, can be whatever you put into it; as well as what you take out of it.
In Matthew 13:24-30, Jesus tells the parable of the sower. Jesus is the sower and the field is the world. He sows good seeds but the enemy of our souls sows bad seeds.
We can relate this story to our daily lives - we are either sowing good seeds, like the wheat or bad seeds, like those rotten old weeds in our lives.
However, unlike the Bible story where both the wheat and tares remain until the harvest, we have to get the weeds out now! They are choking the life out of countless people today.
What are these weeds or tares? They are seeds of contention and strife. We must begin now to till our gardens (our homes) and sow seeds of love and kindness rather than hostility and unkind words. We have to eliminate bad seeds and sow love, peace and joy in their places.
James 3:16 (Amp) says,
"For wherever there is jealousy (envy) and contention (rivalry and selfish ambition), there will also be confusion (unrest, disharmony, rebellion) and all sorts of evil and vile practices."
I heard an interview about disciplining unruly children and how oftentimes children's problems are "learned behavior". They went on to on to say that 99.9% of learned behavior comes from the home life.
We must be ambassadors of Christ's love to our family members. When Jesus commissioned His disciples, He said go to Jerusalem, (meaning our home) Judah, (our cities and communities) and then to the uttermost parts of the world. When we spread the Good News, we are to start at home.
How can we sow good seeds? God tells us how in His Word.
Romans 12:2 (Amp) says,
"Do not be conformed to this world (this age), [fashioned after and adapted to its external, superficial customs], but be transformed (changed) by the [entire] renewal of your mind [by its new ideals and its new attitude], so that you may prove [for yourselves] what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God, even the thing which is good and acceptable and perfect [in His sight for you]."
We can’t take strife and contention to the fields (God’s world); we must take seeds of peace and hope. If we can't get it together with our own gardens (our homes) it may be time for us to do some tilling right where we are planted.
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Cathy Irvin authored well over 50 Devotions for CBN over three decades where she served the Lord Jesus Christ at the Christian Broadcasting Network. Cathy loved telling stories and glorifying God in all that she did. On December 16, 2011, Cathy left this earthly dwelling to take up residence in the dwelling prepared for her in Heaven. Her Devotions minister with love and truth.
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