Raised beds and covering

The other day I built tented coverings over our raised beds, and it occurred to me that I had not written about them for a while.

The previous owners of our property had left tomato frames in the garden area. These are hinged wire-frame sections you can bend to make box-like supports. My architectural instincts led me to make cathedrals out of them.

That's an overly generous description of course; I simply bent the sections into little greenhouses with gabled roofs. I used metal wire for the structural ties.

But as I worked, cathedrals were on my mind because of what the English writer John Summerson once said: the sublime vaulting of the Gothic cathedrals were spawned by the universal human desire to be covered.

Security comes when you are covered.

As little children, Summerson said, we all played "house" by getting under a table or some other piece of furniture. And we'd feel secure.

From that need for security came the great cathedrals.

And the results of covering are palpable. I built those tents two weeks ago before our trip to the Midwest. It was because the plants were wilting, their leaves pecked at by birds and bugs. They were generally not doing well. But when I checked under the tents yesterday, our vegetables were thriving.

Security comes when you are covered.

There is an obscure passage in the Bible that often crosses my mind as I go about my day. It makes reference to an ancient angelic being as "the anointed cherub that covereth." Many commentators hold that this being was none other than Lucifer, more commonly known as Satan.

He was once the anointed cherub whose responsibility was to "cover" the entire creation of God. When that covering was in place, Beauty was in place. But for some reason beyond our present ability to comprehend, he decided to rebel. When he did rebel, the creation of God became uncovered.

And so the world today is what we see: it is generally not doing well.

Except, of course, we now have our Covering back. Remaining under His covering brings forth much fruit.

These thoughts come to mind as I look at those tents.

Logos2Go

John 15.5 “I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing..."

Psalm 61.4 I long to dwell in your tent forever and take refuge in the shelter of your wings. (KJV: I will trust in the covert of thy wings).

Ezekiel 28.12b-15 ... Thus saith the Lord GOD; Thou sealest up the sum, full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty. 13 Thou hast been in Eden the garden of God; every precious stone was thy covering, the sardius, topaz, and the diamond, the beryl, the onyx, and the jasper, the sapphire, the emerald, and the carbuncle, and gold: the workmanship of thy tabrets and of thy pipes was prepared in thee in the day that thou wast created. 14 Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth; and I have set thee so: thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. 15 Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee.

John Summerson, "Heavenly Mansions: An Interpretation of Gothic" in John Summerson, Heavenly Mansions and Other Essays on Architecture (New York: W.W. Norton, 1963), 1-28