Just Writing.....

[Shofargirl46]

My Father is the Gardener

Spring has come, the town where I live already has tourists arriving but still the gardeners are out pruning back, clearing out tidying up the wilderness that has grown over the winter time.

As I walk through the lanes in the country where I live I love the winding narrow lanes free of cars. The sound of the traffic disappears and I can now walk down the middle of the lane free, sauntering with my dog. Sometimes I stop so she can sniff the ground as dogs do. There was a time when I would say ‘come on Cindy hurry up’. But I have learnt to saunter, ponder and slow to a snails pace; what is the hurry I think? None. I take in the smells of the earth, I watch the sunlight glimmer through the trees, my head turns to the colour yellow as the heads of the daffodils are still coming through. It always amazes me the first colour to come through against the foliage is the brilliant colour of yellow. When I see this I know Spring has come. From the darkness of winter comes the sun.

I listen to the birds singing and say ‘hello’. I’m sure they know I’m coming, fanciful I know but I like to think they sing for me. I have no idea what the names of these birds are but I love their different songs. I have no idea what the names of the flowers are but I love their heads of different colours.

Although I read many words I never fully understand what people are trying to say, it is all so complicated but I do know when my heart has touched with someone else’s when spirit joins with spirit this I recognise and understand.

I married a man once, the father of my first and only child. I had to fight to keep her. I had to fight the fact he did not want her. I had to fight to make her life happen. Oh what a blessing my one and only child has given me. When I had her I had to keep on fighting when those around me professed to love me tried to take her away from me maliciously even though they did not want her life to exist in the first place. She was and is a gift of love to me who knew no love. God is love. God fought with me and she was born against all the odds as I too was nearly destroyed.

Then I met Jesus and I understood. Though his words are few my heart knew. My husband intellectualised everything and used words against me as did the lady who brought me up and pretended to be my mother. Words have no meaning to me but when spoken through love then I understand.

Jesus says ‘my sheep know my voice’. I do, it is the voice of love. Jesus says there will be shepherds who will scatter the sheep because they know not love and the sheep do not recognise their voice.

As I walk the quiet country lanes each day sometimes two or three times a day I ponder quietly with my friend Jesus. He walks with me and speaks to me not with words but with his heartbeat of love and I understand. In quietness and trust.

As I see the gardeners at work around in their humble overalls, their muddy hands digging the earth, pulling up roots, pruning back bushes for better growth I am always reminded of the True Gardener, my true Father. They quietly work away unassumingly silent in their work. No one really notices them for their work is never recognised.

When I met Jesus and I have met him several times in my lifetime I can always remember a sermon I heard at the local Methodist church and the truth of what he said will stay in me forever for it was the Father speaking directly to my heart. If you have seen Jesus then you have seen the Father. The truth of that hit me for Jesus and the Father are one.

I think and ponder on the scripture where Mary grieving thinking she had lost Jesus when an angel spoke to her. She too thought he was the gardener. Isaiah through his writings spoke that there was nothing at all about him that would attract us to him.

As I passed this gardener the other day and I said a hello to him that morning, my thought was he could be an angel just watching over those who come down the path. The Father knows who are is as does Jesus for they are One.