Thank you to Nancy Dart, guest blogger, who submitted this post.
Recently, at a local, busy store while I was shopping for
some ‘ideal’ soil to amend my ‘not-so-ideal’ soil to grow vegetables in my home
Victory Garden I noticed an intent young mother. She pushed a very large cart with two little
girls in the seats, and another younger lass surrounded with young plants. Little girls with
freckles and smiles, the youngest, perhaps about three years old, with lovely
bright strawberry hair in an untidy braid and a halo of frizz around her sweet,
freckled face. They chattered to each other and to their mother, holding their
own little plants in their hands.
I held my breath at such beauty! What gifts we have been given by God! I have been in that mother’s shoes, as many
of us have, intent on the quotidian demands of our lives, a long list of things
to get done before we can get to the rest of the items on our lists; and
totally unaware of the face of God shining in the ordinary.
It was evident that the mother was teaching her little ones
some things about gardening — about how to plant, care for, and nurture other
beings. They were with her as she shopped, they held little plants in their
hands that they chose for their own.
The Victory of this Earth Garden is in the love of a parent, who works hard and doesn’t often see the blessings; the Victory
is the presence of children and nature in the cycle of life; the Victory is in
the learning that will occur as these little ones tend to their own little
plants today, gardens tomorrow, families and communities in the future. Amidst
the backdrop of the appearance of a sometimes hopeless world (if one listens to the news too
much) was the reminder of faith and grace in the unassuming activities of a
sweet little family.
This mother and her children were unaware of the holiness of
their activities but I want to thank them for their blessing from the Earth Garden. I bought a bag of
dirt but received a gift that was priceless.
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