In our lives gardening might be one of the things we are responsible for. The mowing, trimming, watering, planting; you name it, we do it; many weekends of the year. Some of us enjoy it and some consider it a never-ending torture. But at times, as we work outside in the heat, God can show us some things about our lives and His relationship with us.

Last week, thinking about the dying grass in the front yard and going back to a watering schedule, God said that "man is grass, who withers and fades but lives on in Spirit." Going to a handy concordance, looking up "grass," and in 1Peter 1:24, God is saying Christian "grass" is made up of "imperishable seed." This struck a cord of verification and renewal; and gave some more inspiration for a later message to share. The verse; "…and the rocks cry out;" is so true about how God uses His creation to help us through our lives.

And with this, God, also, wants to share with you another message using one of his creations. Each one of us are like leaves on a tree. We are born on a tree: a bud. This bud cannot ask to be placed on a specific location on the tree. We spring up on a specific place on a specific branch. This branch might be placed on the tree where its leaves will get the ultimate in sunshine or it might be inside the trees' canopy where the light is choked from all the outside branches. Our "family" branch might be a thick, strong source of our nourishment, or might be a thin, half-broken or cut piece trying itself to survive, let-alone trying to support all of its leaves growing out from it.

We have no choice where we are placed. We become a product of the branch we are on. We want to grow from that branch, a mature green leaf: but sometimes the nourishment and sunlight is substandard. We want to be totally green, but some of us develop brown spots and edges. Is it our fault that we have developed these imperfections? No, actually, we are the product of what has happened in the past to our "family" branch. Maybe years before a nail was driven into our branch. The nail rusted over the years causing the branch to decay and whither. But as we grow we are stuck on that branch.

And then comes the bugs. Those pests that from the outside come and nibble at us. If we are on the inside canopy, where it is cooler for them, a greater number come to feast on our family`s branch. As they take away more-and-more of who we are, we try to rely more and more from our family branch to renewal us. If our branch is strong we can heal, but if our branch is trying just to survive itself, it will be harder for us to survive.

As leaves, or as any other living creation, we are born to die; thus the physical "circle of life." As part of this physical cycle we start changing as we grow older. There is a certain time when the support to the family branch starts weakening and we start to turn colors which are independent from any of the our "sibling" leaves. How do we get our different colors? They are a mixture of what we received from the branch, added to the very nature of us as individual leaves. Then comes the time when the support that has tied us to the branch breaks apart and we float down or carried off by the wind.

So now what? What happens next? God has said "the sins of the father visit the sins of his children and their offspring, from generation to generation." Sin is sin, but truly, the issue is what will happen to each leaf as it continues its life journey separate and away from the "family branch.?" This life journey will be continued in the next message.