A long time ago a young woman I had met in the small town where we lived, asked me for some advice.  Her marriage was suffering and she didn’t know what to do. 

I was too young for her to be asking me, but she had found out I was “a preacher’s wife,” and thought that automatically made me a font of wisdom.  When she finally asked her question, my answer came easily (and with a sigh of relief).  The problem was a perfect fit for a scripture in Corinthians and I simply had her read what the inspired apostle said about it.  I didn’t have to say a word.

Her mouth hung open in shock.  “That’s the answer,” she said.  “But why haven’t my own church leaders been able to show me this verse?”  It was not a difficult passage to find.  Anyone who has grown up attending Bible classes in the church would know where to find it. 

The fact that men who called themselves her spiritual leaders could not help her with the same passage gave me an opening, and we began a Bible study that lasted several weeks.  I was far too idealistic.  I thought when people saw it in black and white, they would instantly change, and that left me wide open for hurt and discouragement.  We finally reached a point where her conscience was pricked and she was floundering about, wondering what to do. 

“Would you come again next week and talk to my church leaders too?” she asked, and what could twenty-two year old me say, but “Of course, if you don’t mind if my husband comes with me.”  She agreed enthusiastically.

All of us met the next Tuesday evening at her home, me with all sorts of great expectations, and an hour long discussion ensued.  To make a long story short, they simply told us that they had more faith than we did because they would accept a piece of literature as inspired which contained neither internal nor external evidences, the kind of evidences that make the Bible obviously true.  I was flabbergasted, and learned my first lesson—some people will believe what they want to believe, not what is reasonable to believe.

The next week I went to her home on Tuesday morning for our usual study.  She met me at the door and, with tears in her eyes, she said, “I’m sorry.  They told me I can’t study with you any more.”

“But don’t you want to?  I helped you when they couldn’t.” 

“I know,” she said.  “But they are my leaders, and I have to obey them.”

Talk about discouraging.  What do you do when someone who is good-hearted and clearly sees the truth allows herself to be taken in by people who obviously cannot—or will not--even help her with her problems?  It isn’t just the stubborn and willful who reject the word of God, another new lesson for me to learn.  In fact, it takes strength of will to accept it when it means you must stand against friends and family, and when your life will experience an instant upheaval. 

So here is the main lesson today:  Be careful whom you trust.  Be careful whom you allow to direct your path, and have the gumption to take responsibility for your own soul.  If someone who wanted the truth could allow it to slip through her fingers so easily at the word of people who were never there for her until it became obvious their numbers might go down, it could happen to you too.  The religious leaders in Jesus’ day looked down on the people with scorn (John 7:49), yet those very people followed them right down the road to Calvary, berating a man who had stood up for them more than once to those same leaders, pushing him to his crucifixion. 

And here is another lesson:  don’t let your idealism make you vulnerable to discouragement.  I will always remember that young woman.  We moved far away not long afterward. As far as I know she stayed where she was religiously, and never found her way out of it.  But I do have this hope—I planted a seed.  God is the one who sees to the increase, 1 Cor 3:6.  Don’t ever in your mind deny God the power to make that seed grow.  I am not as idealistic as I used to be, but I still hope that someday I will meet her again, standing among the sheep.

But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing upon themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their sensuality, and because of them the way of truth will be blasphemed. And in their greed they will exploit you with false words. Their condemnation from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. 2 Peter 2:1-3

Dene Ward

When we lived in another state many years ago, we had two hydrangeas, one flanking each side of the patio steps.  I loved those plants.  They took little care and for that meager effort produced huge balls of blue blooms all summer.  So I decided a few years ago to plant a couple here.
           
I understand that there are white hydrangeas that are supposed to be that way.  They are often used in weddings, which seems appropriate and lovely.  But most hydrangeas are not supposed to be white.  Instead, the color of their blooms depends upon the pH of the soil.  If there is plenty of aluminum in the soil, you get blue blooms.  If aluminum is lacking, you usually get pink. 

If you do not get the color you want, you can change it yourself.  Mix one tablespoon of aluminum sulfate per gallon of water and use it during the growing season.  (Be sure the plant is well-watered beforehand or you could burn your plants.)  If you prefer pink blooms, use dolomite.  I really don’t care if I get pink instead of blue, but I did not want white.  White is what I got.

Some people can’t seem to make up their minds about serving God.   They show up on Sunday morning, but you would never know it if you saw them the rest of the week.  Their dress, language, recreation, and opinions match the world around them.  Like God’s people of old, they “fear the Lord, but serve other gods,” 2 Kings 17:21.  Instead of being either pink or blue, they try to be neutral, thinking it will help them get along with both sides.

Jesus addressed their descendants in Matt 6:24—“You cannot serve two masters,” something we often try to do ourselves, giving our time and energy to the material and only the leftovers, if there are any, to the spiritual.  That is why our prayers are often useless.  We know we aren’t pink or blue, so we pray with “doubt,” like the “double-minded man, unstable in all his ways,” James 1:6-8.

That wasn’t the end of passages I could find.  “How long will you go limping between two sides?” Elijah asked in 1 Kgs 18:12.  “Choose this day whom you will serve,” Joshua demanded, 24:15.  The Lord doesn’t want white hydrangeas any more than I do.  He wants people who can make a decision and stand by it, people who care enough to go all out, not just dabble.  We cannot be wishy-washy.  “If you aren’t with me you are against me,” he told the disciples, Luke 11:23. 

One of my hydrangeas has finally developed a light blue tint.  Then I got my acid and alkaline colors mixed up and had Keith put hydrated lime on it.  So tomorrow it may turn pink.  But it really doesn’t matter—one or the other, pink or blue, just not white.  I didn’t plant it to get some neutral color, and that isn’t why God put us where he did either.

I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. Would that you were either cold or hot! So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spew you out of my mouth. Rev 3:15-16

Dene Ward

Growing tomatoes can be easy, but if you must deal with poor soil instead of rich loam, it isn’t.  If you have bacteria-infected soil, it isn’t.  If blights, mildews, and fungi abound, it isn’t.  If the insects rise in swarms every time you bump a plant, it isn’t.  We have all of the above, so growing tomatoes here is certainly not easy.

Every year we have a handful of plants that grow to about a foot’s height, then stop.  Their leaves curl and they never set a bloom.  They remain green and don’t die outright, but they don’t grow and they don’t produce fruit.  We call them the “frizzled plants” because of the curled leaves and the stunted growth.

Listening and considering new ideas is imperative to our spiritual growth, to improving our attitudes and characters.  Keith has actually come across a couple of people who have told him, “Even if you could show me in the Bible where I’m wrong, I wouldn’t change.  I’m comfortable where I am.”  A comfort zone is prime territory for stunted growth.  What do you do, but sit there and watch their leaves curl?

Others have a pride issue.  They can’t possibly be wrong about anything.  Hear the sarcasm in Job’s voice as he deals with his so-called friends: “No doubt you are the [only wise] people, and wisdom will die with you,” 12:2.  When people will not listen to anyone else, they will only grow as far as their own knowledge will reach, and then stop.

Parents can stifle growth when they view differing opinions as disrespect.  Even parents who don’t mean to do so are used as an excuse not to listen.  “But my daddy said…”  Don’t you think Daddy had enough personal integrity to change his mind if someone showed him he was in error?

Indifference can stunt your growth.  In fact, it is a wonder some people managed to germinate a seed at all, much less grow enough to look at least a little like a Christian.  Their apathy prevents them from getting any farther.

Wealth can strangle you so that the seed never receives the nourishment it needs. They are those who hear the word, but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it proves unfruitful. Mark 4:19.

Immaturity, which Paul repeatedly calls carnality in 1 Corinthians, can stunt your growth.  When you are concerned about the wrong things and your perspective is distorted, when you can’t see beyond the instant gratification of things, status and the opinion of others, you will never comprehend the true necessities of spiritual life.  You certainly won’t grow in the grace and knowledge of the Lord.

We need to look at ourselves and the things that matter most to us.  Examine your spiritual growth in the past year or two.  Can you see a difference, or are you still sitting in exactly the same place with curled leaves and no fruit on your limbs?  Are you stretching those limbs upward, or do they droop to the earth, where the only things that matter to you happen to be?

What is getting in the way of your growth?  Don’t be a frizzled tomato plant.

The righteous flourish like the palm tree and grow like a cedar in Lebanon. They are planted in the house of the LORD; they flourish in the courts of our God. They still bear fruit in old age; they are ever full of sap and green, Psa 92:12-14.

Growing tomatoes can be easy, but if you must deal with poor soil instead of rich loam, it isn’t.  If you have bacteria-infected soil, it isn’t.  If blights, mildews, and fungi abound, it isn’t.  If the insects rise in swarms every time you bump a plant, it isn’t.  We have all of the above, so growing tomatoes here is certainly not easy.

Every year we have a handful of plants that grow to about a foot’s height, then stop.  Their leaves curl and they never set a bloom.  They remain green and don’t die outright, but they don’t grow and they don’t produce fruit.  We call them the “frizzled plants” because of the curled leaves and the stunted growth.

Listening and considering new ideas is imperative to our spiritual growth, to improving our attitudes and characters.  Keith has actually come across a couple of people who have told him, “Even if you could show me in the Bible where I’m wrong, I wouldn’t change.  I’m comfortable where I am.”  A comfort zone is prime territory for stunted growth.  What do you do, but sit there and watch their leaves curl?

Others have a pride issue.  They can’t possibly be wrong about anything.  Hear the sarcasm in Job’s voice as he deals with his so-called friends: “No doubt you are the [only wise] people, and wisdom will die with you,” 12:2.  When people will not listen to anyone else, they will only grow as far as their own knowledge will reach, and then stop.

Parents can stifle growth when they view differing opinions as disrespect.  Even parents who don’t mean to do so are used as an excuse not to listen.  “But my daddy said…”  Don’t you think Daddy had enough personal integrity to change his mind if someone showed him he was in error?

Indifference can stunt your growth.  In fact, it is a wonder some people managed to germinate a seed at all, much less grow enough to look at least a little like a Christian.  Their apathy prevents them from getting any farther.

Wealth can strangle you so that the seed never receives the nourishment it needs. They are those who hear the word, but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it proves unfruitful. Mark 4:19.

Immaturity, which Paul repeatedly calls carnality in 1 Corinthians, can stunt your growth.  When you are concerned about the wrong things and your perspective is distorted, when you can’t see beyond the instant gratification of things, status and the opinion of others, you will never comprehend the true necessities of spiritual life.  You certainly won’t grow in the grace and knowledge of the Lord.

We need to look at ourselves and the things that matter most to us.  Examine your spiritual growth in the past year or two.  Can you see a difference, or are you still sitting in exactly the same place with curled leaves and no fruit on your limbs?  Are you stretching those limbs upward, or do they droop to the earth, where the only things that matter to you happen to be?

What is getting in the way of your growth?  Don’t be a frizzled tomato plant.

The righteous flourish like the palm tree and grow like a cedar in Lebanon. They are planted in the house of the LORD; they flourish in the courts of our God. They still bear fruit in old age; they are ever full of sap and green, Psa 92:12-14.

Dene Ward