Mother’s Day Planting

My family works in the warm spring sun, planting our enormous garden. The kids and I develop a rhythm: I dig a hole, he dumps a scoop of compost, she drops in the seed. We scooch a few inches to the right and repeat: Dig, dump, drop (scooch). Dig, dump, drop (scooch). Bit by bit we complete the entire row.

Where I live, it isn’t warm enough to plant tomatoes, beans, or zucchini until mid-May, so we call these the “Mother’s Day Plants.” And for gardeners, like mothers, once the initial labor of starting new life is finished there is plenty more work still ahead—and a long, long wait before we see the fruit of our efforts.

When my kids were younger, the waiting was torture. No sooner were the tiny seedlings packed into the warm soil than they would dig them back up to check for progress. No sooner would a carrot-top peek through the ground than they would pull it from the ground, looking for a deliciously orange tip. “Don’t worry, Mommy” they would pacify me, “we put it back again.”

They killed their share of plants this way, but who can blame them? When it comes to nurturing new life, we’re all hoping for spoilers, confirmation that our efforts are not in vain.

As I write in both Long Days of Small Things and All Shall Be Well, “Creation is God’s signature move.” Genesis 2 describes Him as the first gardener, planting this world by hand. Both Job and the Psalms include soaring poetry of God tenderly, powerfully creating the universe. The entire Scripture is a testament to the Alpha and Omega, the Almighty One who holds all living things in His hands.

Furthermore, He created us to follow in His footsteps, creating in the soil, in our workspaces, in our world. For parents, our creation extends to our families. Even those without biological children do this work by “spiritually parenting” children. For some mothers, we do this sacred God-work even within our own bodies and souls.

But then comes the work and the waiting. Long nights of shielding vulnerable life from storms and threats, long days of weeding and working to keep life alive. Like my kids, I’m dying to peek ahead and make sure all this investment is heading in the right direction, to make sure my children will be okay, that I’m doing this right, doing enough.

Tenderly, carefully, we nurture tiny babies, head-strong toddlers, precious preschoolers, strong, growing children and teens. In this springtime of their lives they capture us with wonder, with the miracle and beauty of new life. They wear us out with constant care, relentless investment. We pour ourselves out, day and night, that they might live and thrive. We grow dry at times, weary from the non-stop effort. We wilt and worry, and there isn’t enough of us to go around; we wonder if we’re still there somewhere under all the weigh of nurturing. We look to the future and realize with a shock that it is unknowable; that this investment comes with no certainty or guarantees. That we cannot pull up the leaves to peek and see what fruit is growing under the ground.

But there is one thing we can be certain of—the faithfulness of the Creator. And I’m convinced that our children are not the only ones being created during this season: all this nurturing, serving, and pouring out for our little ones forms our own souls, too. The growth may be hard to see, during the busy growing season; we won’t have time or energy to pull up our own roots to notice what God is cultivating there underneath it all. But I’m convinced it’s happening all the same.

This spring, during this season of Mother’s Day planting, may you remember that creating and nurturing new life is God-work. That as you pour yourself out you are being formed in the secret places, into the image of the One who planted the first garden (Genesis 2) and the final, eternal tree (Revelation 22); who is faithful to nurture His own creation every single day in between.

After an endless night of labor, new life is born with the sunrise. After the unrelenting cold and dark of winter, spring arrives triumphantly. Our spirits have gone dormant as we put one foot in front of the other for so long we’ve lost track of the journey—but we awaken to find that perseverance has developed into character, and character into hope. And this hope does not disappoint us.

 

There’s no time now for silence and reflection, so we won’t notice that our hearts and minds are being made new. Deep, deep roots are developing while we are too busy persevering to notice.

 

One day, in the quiet peace of another season, may you stumble upon a nearly forgotten garden and find it bursting forth with the resilient, lovely fruit and flowers of spring.

 

(from Long Days of Small Things: Motherhood as a Spiritual Discipline, NavPress).

Thanks be to you, Creator God.

Looking for an encouraging Mother’s Day gift?

Check out Catherine’s book Long Days of Small Things.

Catherine McNiel writes to open eyes to God’s creative, redemptive work in each day. She is the author of Long Days of Small Things: Motherhood as a Spiritual Discipline (NavPress). Her second book All Shall Be Well: Awakening to God’s Presence in His Messy, Abundant World (NavPress) is available for preorder on amazon.com. Connect with Catherine at catherinemcniel.com.