Death and Life (In that order)

     I was too sick with mono this summer to keep up with my garden. We enjoyed a small portion of the abundant tomatoes and peppers that did better than in any previous year here, but we did not consume many, and I did not can them which had been one of my summer goals. It was simply unmanageable for me. To even think to ask for help with it was not possible.

     By fall, with the virus still wreaking havoc with my cognitive function, hundreds of fruits fell to the ground, dead and rotting. It was one more symbol of defeat in a simple corner of my world that is precious to me.

     But some time around our first freeze I happened past the atrophied remains of a potted patio tomato. A bit of green caught my eye and I saw, poking out amongst the downed brown maple leaves below my potting bench, that a seed had kept warm and protected enough to sprout and grow to almost 3 inches tall. It was the same patio tomato that had blessed me with fruit in the sunroom the winter before! Digging down in the dirt bin below the frost, I filled a pot with soil and scooped the little tomato trooper into it. Then as I passed through the garden on my way to the sunroom I picked up the remains of three fallen comrades of various colors -dried out tomato skins filled with seeds- and poked them into the pot around my little green banner of encouragement. It was more an act of faint hope than any real expectation.

In John 12:24 and 25 Jesus is referring to his upcoming death on the cross and said: "Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. Anyone who loves their life will lose it, while anyone who hates their life in this world will keep it for eternal life."

I have hated my life a great deal of late, and have felt the loss of significant and unexpected portions of what has meant life to me from basic physical function to ministry, and even some friendships. I have even felt, on some very dark days, that real death would be far better than the unrelenting smallness of what my life was becoming. But I am beginning to see again, I think, and today I have a few glimmers of hope that this time has produced seeds that will someday sprout and, Lord willing, bear fruit.

The picture at the top is the mess that litters the ground in my tomato beds. It looks like a wasteland to me and used to represent months of disappointment and sadness. What a shock that every one of the seeds in those three dried out skins burst into life by the dozen! In a few weeks they will need to be transplanted and to be honest, I'm not sure how or where I will keep them until April or May when they can safely be put into the garden! They will be huge by then, so this will prove to be an exciting, unexpected adventure for a frustrated and recovering gardener and something to really look forward to. And to the right is my 'tomato trooper'. It is blooming and I have used my soft, fine brush to pollinate the flowers in the absence of bees. In a month, there may be fresh tomatoes in our salad! And I am hopeful that my season of 'death' will result in new beginnings and growth and fruit, too.