Imagine you have a garden. One day you decide to water the garden, to put miracle grow in it, to pull up all the weeds that have begun to grow. You take great care of it. You got dirt under your fingernails and actually started sweating. Even though it was hot outside, you really wanted this garden to be beautiful and to flourish. But then, you wake up the next morning and you are sore all over and you are a bit tired. So, instead of going back out to the garden to water and pull more weeds, you decide you will stay in and watch a movie. You say to yourself “maybe tomorrow I’ll feel like tending to the garden.”
Many times, this is the lifestyle we decide to lead with our relationship with God. See, we need to tend to our relationship with God as we would need to tend to a garden in order for us to grow. We must dig up the soil and know that there will be rocks. These rocks are like the trials that come and go in our life. We will have to make our roots strong enough to get past the rocky times. We need to make sure we are planted in the sunshine, the light of God. Doing so will give us continuous joy. We must be sure to pull out all the weeds daily, because they grow fast. The weeds in the garden are like the negativity surrounding us in our lives. We face it daily and must be consistent in pulling it out and throwing it aside. We need the wind to blow hard sometimes in our gardens so that the roots may dig a little deeper each day and grow stronger. The wind is like God challenging us to pursue after a deeper relationship with him. He may push and blow just a little harder than we are used to in order to get us out of our comfort zones, but, if we hold steadfast in his word and in prayer, our roots will grow deeper in him. These things we must do daily. Consistency is so very important for a strong and healthy relationship with God. Just like the garden, we cannot take care of our relationship with God and grow in him one day, then the next decide to see what the world has to offer us. It says in Luke 16:13(ESV) No servant can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.
We cannot feed both our spiritual walk with God and also snack on what the world is offering (1 Corinthians 10:21). If we do not stay consistent, then we will find that we will never have a deep and strong relationship with God. In John 15:4 God says, Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me. To abide means to stay in a given place. There is no better place to stay than in the loving arms of God.
As it says in 1 John 2:6 He who says he abides in Him ought himself also to walk just as he walked. Walking here talks of a consistent motion. This is saying that we should be striving to follow in God’s footsteps. I can tell you one thing that is for sure, Jesus never faltered. He didn’t walk in relationship with God one day and reep the goodness thereof and then decide to see what the world would give him the next day. No, he stayed steadfast in God, praying daily. That is consistency. Let me leave you with this beautiful thought. In 1 Corinthians 15:8 it says, Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.
Whatever we do in God, wherever we go, whoever we speak to, our labor will not be in vain. We will be doing good. If we can stay consistent. If we can grow past the rocks (the tough trials in our life), stay in the light (God’s light, that is), get water daily (the word), pull out the weeds (negativity), and if we aren’t afraid to get a little dirt under our fingernails (because it happens in growth), then we will be living a consistent life in God. It takes work and can be the harder road sometimes, but God never promised it would be easy, but He did say he would be right beside us through it all, so don’t be afraid of a little dirt.
