Gardens and dying

"We all know we'll eventually die, and yet we all go on with life's things ..."

She said that over dinner. We were talking about someone else, but ... somewhere in the background I sense the breast cancer she struggled with earlier this year. She's cancer-free now, but of course it's left its mark. In many ways.

We're closer now for having gone through it together; that's one way. But I think another way is you're more aware of just how fragile life is, and you wonder how many years you really have left.

"Are we working in the garden this evening?" I said.

"I guess so."

I'm hauling wheelbarrows of pine needles from our property to use for mulch between the raised beds. The evening is cool. It's a good time to reflect. What is it about fascination with gardens?

Beans and corn are breaking through the soil in the raised beds. She just planted them into the black soil several days ago.

Unless a grain of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abides alone. But if it dies, it brings forth much fruit.

Logos2Go

John 12.24 Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.

1 Corinthians 15.35-38 But someone may ask, “How are the dead raised? With what kind of body will they come?” How foolish! What you sow does not come to life unless it dies. When you sow, you do not plant the body that will be, but just a seed, perhaps of wheat or of something else. But God gives it a body as he has determined, and to each kind of seed he gives its own body.

1 Corinthians 15. 42-49 So will it be with the resurrection of the dead. The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable; it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. So it is written: “The first man Adam became a living being”a; the last Adam, a life-giving spirit. The spiritual did not come first, but the natural, and after that the spiritual. The first man was of the dust of the earth, the second man from heaven. As was the earthly man, so are those who are of the earth; and as is the man from heaven, so also are those who are of heaven. And just as we have borne the likeness of the earthly man, so shall web bear the likeness of the man from heaven.