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Summer Growth: Ugly and Tattered Growth


Some of my beautiful hostas were shredded in a recent hail storm.  They were going to be beautiful this year because of the timely moisture and their maturity.  I was so sad and I had decisions to make.

Would it be best to cut the broken stems and leaves, or leave them be?  

Ugly and tattered?  
Even the new ones that had one single empty stem now?  

Did they have any value left?


"I can't cut you," I say out loud.  "You need what you have left to gather energy and nutrients to restore your roots."  After consulting the oracle, (google) I found I was right. (I always wonder what my neighbors think after I stand over my plants conversing with them over tough decisions. lol) 

They may not be pretty or very functioning this summer.  On the other hand,  if they stay and wait and absorb, they will become strong once more.

God is so good to me!  He speaks to my heart through a language I can understand.  One I experience and feel. 

He spoke to me:

"Daughter, you may be tattered and have broken and unhealthy aspects of your life, but you have value.  Just as you are.  Wait on me.  Hear and accept and absorb all I have for you.  Be still.  Don't try to fix it or worry about the way it all looks, the whys and the what ifs. This is a growth period for you.  The weight of worry and anxiety and loss have weakened you on the outside but allow me to renew your heart.  Your inner man is being renewed day by day.  Be still.  I am God."

  '…For all things are for your sakes, so that the grace which is spreading to more and more people may cause the giving of thanks to abound to the glory of God.  

Therefore we do not lose heart, but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day. For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison,…"(2 Cor. 4:15-19)


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