Yard Walk

Every so often, I try to walk through the yard with my camera, documenting blooms, progress, beauty, and whatever catches my eye. Unfortunately, I’ve had a lot of aphids, slugs, and disease throughout my yard this year. I’m hoping it is mostly due to the excessive rain and cold temperatures during the months of May and June. While we often have cool weather and rain during that time, it is normally interspersed with nice sunny days. Perfect growing weather. This year has been a struggle for growing things. We had two months of cold and wet and then a week ago went straight to solid heat. It’s stressful for plants, and that makes them susceptible to insects and disease.

Despite the weather, insects, and disease, growth still happened! Perhaps next year at this time my yard will be even stronger and more beautiful than before, because each and every plant had to work for every bloom. But even now, I was able to find the beauty.

 

I got to thinking while I was writing and considering the difficulties of the garden, that perhaps this can be applied to life. Our life, even. This has been a particularly difficult spring and summer so far for a variety of reasons. Time after time we were faced with challenges, prayer requests, and difficult news from loved ones. It’s stressful. We’ve had "cool and rainy” weather, and yet despite that, God is good. Things grow. There is beauty. And maybe, by next year at this time, we will be stronger because of these challenges and trials.