A Well Watered Garden

The scripture verse I am thinking about today:

The Lord will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail. - Isaiah 58:11

I love that imagery. A well-watered garden. It's truly a beautiful metaphor for the way the Lord ministers to His people. 

During the infamous summer of 2020 when everything shut down for "two weeks to flatten the curve" our little family was establishing a garden.

First, I marked out the area we would build the garden in.

Then, we began to work the ground.

Uri helped us filter the rocks out of the dirt. There were a lot of rocks!

Jacob used some old bricks to build a mini wall to keep the rabbits out, and we would use a lightweight fencing to keep the chickens out.

Uri loved to help his Dada.

The look of wonder, awe, and delight on my son's face... there's nothing like it. When God said He would make mankind in His own image and His own likeness... he was thinking about my little boy. That's the best way I can describe it. Perhaps other parents can relate to the feeling. Before becoming a mother, I had experienced awe and wonder in my life at times. Or so I thought. Watching my son delight in creation was like rediscovering all over again the raw essence of all that is good and right and lovely.

We were given some raspberry bush starts from a friend's garden, which we planted and watered as well. We didn't necessarily expect them to produce any fruit that first year, but they did. They produced one berry. I hope it was a sweet one. I gave it to Uri, who absolutely loved berries, and he ate it. There would be many more berries the next summer, but Uri wouldn't be there to enjoy them. I'm glad he got to eat that first berry. Sometimes it's the littlest memories that bring me both solace and fresh grief. 

Our Garden was very humble in its beginnings that first year, and we loved it. I think we will always think of it as "Uri's garden", even thought it has grown and changed over these last two years without him. No one will ever love that garden as much as Uri did, though I pray his younger siblings make it into the world and get to enjoy it as he enjoyed it. Or perhaps we will live somewhere else and start a new garden, the they too will have the experience like he did of seeing raw land transformed into a lovely garden. We cannot know the future, we can only press forward into it one step at a time.

Blessings.