The Orphan Garden

I posted this entry last year about this time, but I think it is so relevant to this transition in seasons between summer and fall. Summer is a season in which many are traveling, away, out of routine, on vacation, but for some…summer is a time of isolation and lack of support and growth because their home circumstances are not as stable as when they are enrolled in school.

Though we may not all be returning to a school environment, the transition from summer to fall often involves re-establishing connection and opportunity for connection that had otherwise fallen away over the sweltering summer months.

This Fall I encourage you to look for the people and gardens that appear to have been abandoned, run wild, overgrown, and seek the fruit God desires to grow there.

We didn’t have a vegetable garden this year. But we did inherit our neighbor’s garden. The older couple typically travels north for the sweltering Georgia summers and while they had planted and tended in the early spring months, they let us know before departing, we were welcome to tame or claim whatever came of the wild and abandoned plot.

Wild, it was, with fertile soil but with no diligent weeder on the watch, it has grown lush and free, a secluded oasis the lawnmower politely skirts around. But even with minimal attention, this garden has produced some delicious fruit.

A new task of independence we have given our seven year old is to ride his bike through the short trail that runs along the creek between our house and the neighbor’s to retrieve any ripe tomatoes or bell peppers drooping from the vines.

Returns, he does, with a toothless grin iconic of a second grader. “Prepare to be amazed,” he states before he reveals his bounty each time. Having reached into the dense brush, he finds what seems like sacred gifts that the orphan garden volunteers to those who seek it, hidden among the overgrowth. Life, it seems, will always find a way.

God’s will for our lives will always find a way, too. Planted deep inside of each of us, no matter what weeds or circumstances might attempt to obscure it, He desires to produce in us the gifts for which we were always meant to give. He is working all the time, through all seasons.

As we return to our communities this fall, both back to school and hopefully back to some continued sense of normalcy among each other, let us look for the gardens that may have been abandoned, run wild, or run ragged over time. Let us find the hidden fruits they still desire to produce, the will to live abundantly that is strong and present within each of us, and let us be the gardener to one another that helps find a home and purpose for each sacred gift still growing on the vine.

Let us cheerfully exclaim all of our days to one another, “Prepare to be amazed,” as we proclaim the work that God intends to do now and every day after. Let us make way for the miracles He has in store, just beneath the overgrowth of summer.

The neighbor who planted the garden in this story passed away in December 2021. Though the physical grounds have been cleared, by God’s grace, I like to think his garden continues to produce every time we share this story.