Wisdom

             Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you. But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. Such a person is double-minded and unstable in all they do. (James 1:2-8)

 

            It’s springtime! That means a huge chunk of my life is focused on my garden. On April 1, my brain says, “P.L.A.N.T!” but I can’t. The weather isn’t ready and it won’t be ready for at least a month – maybe two. The garden beds aren’t ready, and until it warms up, disturbing the soil may mean disturbing pollinators that are necessary to a healthy ecosystem. The trial involves a lot of waiting. I’m finding that trials and struggles involve a lot of waiting. But once the waiting part is over, there’s still work to do to get the beds ready for the plants and the plants ready for the bed. And the only way I end up with a garden out of the deal is if I persist even when there are no plants.

            During the cleaning up, I find a great need for wisdom, and some of that wisdom is already mine. I know that this plant is a wild violet, and that’s a dandelion. But is that echinacea? Milkweed? What is that? The little tag in that pot says pansies, but those leaves aren’t pansy leaves. Ew, bug! But is it a garden friend or a garden foe? Where am I supposed to plant what? Just how many garden beds can I tend? What can I grow in some of them so that I don’t need to tend them and still get a benefit?

            By mid-May, most of this should be figured out. Then comes the next challenge: tending the plants, watering, feeding, weeding, and dealing with infestations. This is not a time in which one keeps digging up plants and moving them from point A, to point B, to point C, D, E, and Z. Doubting and changing one’s mind like a wave tossed about by the wind. Stability is necessary for plants to thrive. It’s about persistence again. And if I am persistent in the struggle at the beginning, seek wisdom when questions arise in the brief middle, and persistent in the tending, the most obvious result should be crops and/or beauty. But another result will be persistence, and another will be wisdom.

            In a way, the passage begins and ends with the trial of our faith. It’s an endless cycle. We struggle. We seek wisdom. We apply the wisdom (or don’t) and struggle again, this time to normalize what we’ve learned and prevent “weeds” from reducing the harvest, which results in our harvest of faith.  It’s not some strange thing. It’s as normal and natural as any other process.