I watched my little six-year-old play with his new garden two days ago. He’d taken great care to fill the pot with soil. After that, he placed a few rocks to rest a toy house on. Next, he created a little turquoise walkway of colorful mini-stones leading up to a tiny house.
He was constructing a miniature terrarium of a sorts. Since we homeschool, I’m always on the lookout to teach science, etc., in ways that his six-year-old mind will comprehend and even enjoy. Thus, when I’d found the creative little kit to build a miniature garden, I snagged it. It was the perfect opportunity to help him understand plant cycles, etc.
But as I watched him constructing his new creation, I marveled at the joy he felt for his work. Later, after he snugged seeds down inside the soil, and watered it just so, he sat back on his haunches. He quietly looked at it for (I kid you not) nearly a half-hour.
He wasn’t aware that I was watching him, but watch I did. He would stroke the soil. He’d pat certain portions into better places than the first. He’d place a miniature-toy frog in front of the house to guard his creation. In fact, at one point he came rushing in, blazing past me into the bedroom. Soon enough, he returned racing to his post outside.
Kneeling down, he tenderly put a little Lego man inside the house. Then he returned to kneel in front of the entire little experiment and continued to speak to all of it.
I thought how much this is like our Father which is in Heaven. He created our little spot of soil (although much bigger than my son’s terrarium, I grant you that). He carefully snugged in rocks and boulders, oceans and lakes, all for the benefit of His greatest of creations – us!
And He assigns His Son to stand by, nurturing us, patting “soil” into better locations, all the while tending to our needs. At times we might murmur at His adjustments to our lives, whether physical (i.e. Hurricane Katrina) or whether spiritual (i.e. the loss of my other little son to SIDS).
But through it all, He is the Master at work. And He never leaves our side through it all. And just like when my little son’s seeds begin sprouting, just like when our spiritual growth “seeds” begin sprouting, I’m sure the Lord’s joy is equally as great, if not greater.
How comforting it is to me to know that we are created and made by One who gives His All, His Son, to the whole process, just like my little son did this week to his own endeavors.
