Monday, June 8, 2015

Mormon Monday: Asparagus and Faith

A month or so ago, we planted our garden.

When I was a kid in primary (church classes for children), we sang a song about faith. We talked about how "faith is like a little seed, if planted it will grow. (Faith)" At the time, I though, "Duh, you plant seeds and they grow. Where is the faith in that?"

Faith is so simple when you're a child.

We decided to plant asparagus. I think I mentioned this in a different blog post. (Yes, I did. Here is the link: http://atomicottercinema.blogspot.com/2015/04/gardening.html) I have been praying really hard that those asparagus would come up, and for a while, it looked like we were going to have to try again next year.

Arkhon got into the asparagus, and we kept finding the roots above the soil, half-eaten. We fenced off the asparagus, but we were afraid it was too late. A few weeks passed and there was no sign of life from our asparagus patch.

Then, a couple of weeks ago, Grig came in the house and said, "We have some asparagus!" Surprised, I followed him out, and he showed me where a nearly full-grown plant seemed to have appeared overnight.

Only a few days later, we found another plant that had survived. I was super grateful. I didn't think we were going to have any asparagus, and now we had two. Then, a couple of days later, we found a third plant that had lived.

All three asparagus plants are doing well.

This actually is not our asparagus plant, but it looks pretty similar to it. I found the picture here.  It's too dark to take a picture of ours. I'll post it later.
This is a great analogy for faith. We had faith that the 20 asparagus plants that we planted would grow. We toiled and worked hard to help them, but adversity (Arkhon) appeared and tried to destroy our faith. It caused doubts and made us wonder if any good would come of our efforts.  Even so, we replanted and watered and prayed.

Weeks after we had nearly given up hope, the plants appeared, far larger that we had expected.

Just recently, we had some adversity appear in our lives.

Our car has been having problems again. The alternator broke and we had to get that replaced, delving deeply into our pockets. Then, just last Thursday, we thought we were in really trouble. As I was parked at a store, I returned to find liquid underneath the car. It didn't seem like very much, but it concerned me. As I started the car, the low coolant light came on.

That wasn't a good thing. We quickly bought some antifreeze and poured it into the car. Everything seemed fine, and nothing seemed to be leaking, so we drove away and headed home.

Half-way home, the light came back on.

When I checked the radiator at home, it seemed to be far emptier. I poured some water in, and in moments I heard the sound of water falling to the pavement beneath the car.

It appeared that our radiator had a serious leak. Adversity had appeared and it seemed to be eating all of our finances.

It was really scary that night, we didn't know what we were going to do. We couldn't really afford more car repairs, and we couldn't afford to buy a new car. We prayed pretty hard.

The next day, Grig took the car in, and to our astonishment, everything checked out fine. They didn't even charge us for bringing the car in. They told us that our sensor was probably not working right, but there was plenty of liquid in the radiator and there didn't appear to be any leaks.

He also informed us that sometimes clogs will occur in the radiator during winter, and when they break free, sometimes liquid can spill out. He told us that was probably what we heard. Either way, everything seems to be working fine now.

It is a miracle, and we are very grateful. Just when all hope seemed lost, the Lord blessed us with blossoms and living miracles.

I am very grateful for faith and trials. Without the trials, how would we come to depend on our Savior?

The rest of our garden is doing well too, and we can't complain. We are a little low on money, but we have sufficient for our needs. The Lord is taking care of us, just like he took care of our tiny asparagus patch.

1 comment:

  1. The tender mercies are so much more evident when challenges arise. We are grateful He answered your prayers and that your car is doing okay. We are glad your garden is growing as well.

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