Fellowship of Service

"I will never leave nor forsake thee." This is a promise we can depend on. God's presence, and His provision, has been proven through the ages, daily, to be available to His people in endless supply. When we need His patience, it is waiting for us. When we need God's power, it is working in our lives. When we need God's love, He is there with His arms around us. No battle we fight will find God asleep; no temptation we face will find God distracted; no persecution we suffer will find God weakening; no accusation we endure will find God misunderstanding. There are no shortages in God's resources or creativity. He meets our needs liberally when we ask Him. He is in debt to no one; no one has done God a favor or supplied a lack on God's part.

Job 41:11 Who has a claim against me that I must pay? Everything under heaven belongs to me.

Psalms 46
v.1 God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in time of trouble
v.2 Therefore we will not fear
v.7 The Lord Almighty is with us: the God of Jacob is our fortress
v.10 Be still and know that I am God.

His provision equips us for the job He assigns us. He does a deep work in our hearts and minds, recreating us from the inside out, retooling, remodeling, refreshing, recreating us. Not as a mechanic would do for a car, not as a contractor would do for a kitchen, but as a landscaper would do for the grounds of an estate. Rocks are dug out, thorns are removed, hard ground is broken up and leveled. Flower beds are staked out and built, a spring is dug out so the flow is clean and increased, a pond or lake is established to hold the water, trees are planted for shade, beauty and food, trellises are placed for vines which will give flowers yielding aroma and fruit, funneling the breeze when the day is hot.

But the vision has to be grown into. The bricks and rocks of the flowerbed are placed and the soil amended, but the seeds and young shoots can only be planted and tended. They have to grow into the vision of the gardener who guards against unseasonable frost, flooding rains, untimely hail, persistent attacks from insects and fungus and being eaten or trampled by birds or large animals. The trees are placed where the soil is enriched and water is available, but they give no shade until later, no refreshing fruit until after pruning and maturity. The trellis is in place and a shoot is planted, but it has to be pruned and trained to grow up the trellis in the way the gardener knows will give the most sun to the leaves and the most shade to those in the arbor.

Ecclesiastes 3
v.11 He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.
v.12  I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live.
v.13 That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil—this is the gift of God.
v.14 I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. God does it so that people will fear him.

To be a gardener requires patience and long-suffering, wisdom and understanding, a willingness to invest time and effort with no guarantee of eventual success, staying with it for the sake of the joy that eventually will be when others are comforted and refreshed by the results of the work. God is the Master Gardener; we can be His apprentices if we submit to His directions. He shapes us to conform to His image, and we can join Him in the work of bringing others into His garden.

2 Corinthians 5
v.17 Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!
v.18 All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation
v.19 that God was reconciling the world to Himself in Christ, not counting men's sins against them. And He has committed to us the message of reconciliation
v.21 God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.

Father God, You have never been shy about getting Your hands dirty working in the gardens of our lives. Whenever we lose sight of Your purpose, the work in us seems grievous, but You are faithful to remind us of the vision we once had and joy we shared with You through it. We submit to the work You are doing in us, by the Spirit and by the Body, even as You send us out to work in Your vineyards, for the harvest is ripe and ready to be gathered in. We pray for workers to help in the harvest, for as we go out into the work, we realize the magnitude of the task. Your grace is sufficient and Your spirit is inexhaustible, but we ask for fellow workers to celebrate with once the harvest is in. We pray that our joy may be full as we gather around the feasting table with You when the harvest is done.

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