Dress and Keep part 5
Dressing and keeping the garden is putting on the whole armor of God and guarding your heart. YOU are the garden. The finished work. That's important. Because if you're coming at this life from a position of, "I need to be better," then you're coming at it wrong. This life isn't about obtaining some imaginary, arbitrary measure of what the world calls "success." This life is about love. Period. Full stop. To live is to love and to love is to live. Love is giving. Giving everything you have and everything you are. But you can't give what you don't have. That's why it's so important to know what you have. If you don't know the work is finished, you'll always be trying to finish it. Or lamenting the fact that it ISN'T finished (when, in truth, it is, you just don't know it or believe it). Everything comes down to faith, right? What you believe in your life (either the report of the Lord, or the lie that the world tries to feed you) is what manifests in your life. Look at Galatians 5:6, "for in Jesus Christ neither circumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcision; but faith which worketh by love." It doesn't matter what you DO... it matters what you BELIEVE. What you do FLOWS from what you believe. Behavior modification cannot result in any lasting change. Behaving because you're afraid of punishment or bad consequences isn't sustainable. What it comes down to--always--is the heart. It's a heart issue. Grace doesn't let you get away with stuff you shouldn't be doing, grace keeps you focused on the things you should want to be doing! Look at Proverbs 4:23, "Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life." It's all about love. Fatih, hope, and love. The greatest of which is love. You are what you eat, right? What you consume, or fill yourself with, is what will come out of you. It's too big (whatever it is) not to. So fill yourself with God's love. That's how you keep you heart. Not by keeping it closed, but by keeping it open! Keeping it open to love. Not by hardening it--and I know we all have reasons to harden it--but by keeping it soft. Keeping it sweet. What's that old saying? "Keep your words soft and sweet, you may have to eat them." Or that other old saying, "Everybody is fighting a battle you know nothing about. Be kind." Basically... just love people. The true Gardener, Jesus, has pruned HIS garden (you) so that there is nothing inside but love. That's where I want to go with the next Rant series--what's inside this garden and how it is released into the world. What this garden is really all about. I started with tending and keeping because that was the first command that God gave man after putting him in the finished work of the garden of Eden. That was our first job, if I can say it that way. Maintaining what God had already done. Taking the ball and running with it. Jesus said, in John 14:12, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father." Jesus equips and empowers us to live the abundant life that He came for us to have. Jesus finished the work so we can enjoy the fruit of His labor. Jesus is the true gardener, and we just accept--receive and release--what He has done for us. And in us. And through us. And as us. Jesus is the King of kings. Which means we are kings and priests and we rule and reign on this earth. Jesus is the Gardener. That means we can dress and keep our own garden. By manifesting what He has done in us. By putting on (dressing in) the whole armor of God, and by keeping our hearts with all diligence. Knowing who we are and BEING who we are. Knowing what we have and GIVING what we have!