Strawberries, Context, and Communal Worship
Celebrating the body of Christ while I prep my strawberry beds
…if you believe in God omnipresent, then you must believe everything that comes into your life, person or event, must have something of God in it to be experienced and loved; not hated.
~Elizabeth Goudge
It’s finally warm. Warm-ish, at least. Fifties in the Frozen North is a blessing after a long winter. Everything is beginning to green up, and the final frosts will be few. It’s time for one of the first garden tasks of the season: uncovering my strawberry patch from the layers of leaf mulch that insulated it over the winter.
After hunting down a rake, I begin to pull away the thick layer of leaves. They’ve settled over the winter, but green strawberry leaves peek through. The insulation was successful: I can look forward to decadent berries in June.
That is, if I can get to them… the mulch is not coming off as easily as I prefer. I want to be careful not to damage the plants underneath it, but it’s not making the job easy. The leaves are wet, and small patches of ice hold some places down.
I ditch the rake and opt for a new weapon: a blessed leaf blower. I didn’t know that we had one, but ask and you will receive - apparently we acquired one at some point. Armed with the miraculous leaf blower and some Personal Protective Equipment,1 I launch a second attack against the mulch to free the strawberries.
This time, it works. The blower tears through the dead leaves, sending them across the garden. The wind picks them up, too, carrying them away.
As I work, I think of the community that is growing in my church. God has been working in our church family, to grow us in depth and breadth. As we have grown, it has taken a deliberate effort to get to know one another, so we can live out the love to which God calls us. Relationships take work. Knowing one another is not an instant thing. We must be intentional.
But much like the sweet fruit that will come from uncovering my strawberries, I know that I can look forward to fruit from better knowing my community. And in the same way that I need to dig through an exterior protective layer to find my strawberry plants, for many people, I will have to earn the right to know their stories. I’ll be the first to tell you that I don’t want everyone in the world to know the things on my heart… the things that I carry are not for everyone.
I expect nothing different from the people who I love. I tend to the plants even when they are covered. I do not have to know your story to love you: love is unconditional, so your pain or glories are not what make me love you.
Yet, there is great beauty in knowing the plant that bears the fruit. I think of the strawberries that I’m cleaning up. They were given to me by an old coworker who is the epitome of energy, optimism, and perseverance, despite a life of loss and sacrificial love. Knowing where the plants came from lets me enjoy them more, as they make me think of my friend.
Knowing the context of someone’s life encourages and deepens my faith. As I look around my church during worship on a Sunday morning, I see families dealing with infertility praising God for his trustworthiness. I see friends who have lost jobs declaring that God is their living hope. I see people whose children have died, singing about the goodness of God. Understanding the place from which these people come, and seeing their faith anyways, strengthens my view of God.
I tear up an old layer of weed barrier, which is now covered in strawberry runners and mud. It doesn’t come up easily, but it clears up a fair-sized piece of the patch. Isn’t this encouragement the purpose of communal faith? For the body of Christ to be built up, for God’s glory? We strengthen one another: by standing firm (1 Thess. 3:7-8); bearing one another’s burdens (Galatians 6:2); spurring one another to love and good works (Hebrews 10:23-25).
I blow away the last of the leaves. God made us to bear fruit. But, he didn’t make us to be a strawberry patch, where every plant produces the same fruit in the same way. He made us to be a garden. Each part of the body has a different function and bears different fruit, for the same purpose (Romans 12).
Let us be cultivators in God’s garden, digging in purposefully and uncovering the beauty that shows us more of who he is.
Thanks for spending ~5 minutes of your time with me! Do come again (:
Until next time, then - water your garden, watch a sunrise, and always drink strong coffee.
Faithfully,
Katie Stacey
Note for those who have been around awhile~
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Gardening has such an abundance of metaphors, and this was so lovely. Thank you for sharing!
Loved it! 🥰