Digging in the dirt

My dear wife Nancy calls what you see above as, " Neil digging in the dirt."  It is however much more  than that. A few days ago with it becoming obvious that winter here in Southern California was quickly ending that it was time to get ready for the Spring/Summer garden.  It was a warm February afternoon and I could picture tomatoes growing and squash hiding from me under their leaves.  The winter garden had been kind of a blow out.  Right in the middle of the cool months we had a string of warm eighty degree weather that just confused my winter broccoli-the heads were about three inches round! This past summer with our drought I gave the garden a sabbatical rest for the hot months except for a few tomato plants which didn't do all that well.  The folks at my local church have the idea that I'm some sort of expert gardener.  The past few months have put that idea to bed!  Hope however, springs eternal and so I grabbed my trusty shovel cleared out the weeds that had grown and turned the hard ground over in preparation for some spring planting.
There is something about working in a vegetable garden that is refreshing to ones soul.  The new seedlings and the seeds placed in the ground represent a new start.  Maybe the last season didn't go so well, but this new season is going to be different!  I'm not going to make the same silly mistakes as last year, the weather is going to cooperate  and our kitty isn't going to use my new seed beds as a potty stop.  This new season's garden is going to be a a booming success!  So with great expectations Nancy's husband began digging in the dirt.
The Hebrew prophet Jeremiah had a word for the people of Judah when he proclaimed, "Break up your fallow ground, and do not sow among thorns."  His fellow prophet Hosea had a similar idea  when he wrote, "Break up your fallow ground, for it is time to seek the Lord."  The words fallow ground give the idea of a plot of land that has been left uncultivated for a season with the intent of increasing it's productivity.  For these Hebrew prophets however their message centered around the idea that Israel had drifted away from the Lord and their lives were much like soil that had grown hard and filled with weeds.  These words call Israel to see their lives as being just that: not productive, empty, hard and filled with useless events that have no real lasting value.
In the New Testament Jesus tells a parable of a man who went out to sow seeds in a field.  His seeds fell among four types of soil: by the road, on rocky soil, on soil with weeds and on good soil.  Our decisions and life have a way of leaving us in a place where our hearts could be described as one of the above.  The only soil that produced fruit was the good soil-the soil that had been cleared of weeds and rocks and had been broken up.  Perhaps this year has brought on events and circumstances that have left us a little like the soil I was working on few days ago.  These words from Hebrew scriptures and the New Testament don't condemn us but tell us Spring is just around the corner and with it a promise of new life. Listen carefully to what our friends Jeremiah and Hosea say.