Whoever desires, let him take the water of life freely. Rev. 22:17

The peonies are stunning this year! Their heavy, furled heads cascade over the wire supports almost to the ground, like ripe fruit ready to be plucked. Within a  single flower lies a spectrum  of subtle shades: fuschia, lavender, pink and pale, pale rose. In the evening I tuck drooping stems back inside their supports and marvel at tiny black ants scurrying around the sticky petals. In the early morning I turn on the soaker hoses to give the plants  plenty of water before the heat rises. It’s the first year the peonies have been so luscious and lush. After 5-6 years they finally have grown into themselves – and are now showing off. They’re definitely the drama queens of my late spring garden.

I replanted and changed most of the flower beds in early spring to add shrubs and perennials for easier maintenance in the future. However, I did not touch the peonies. Like me, they don’t like to be uprooted and replanted. No doubt the relatively mild winter and spring rains aided all of the flowers and plants, especially the peonies, but I did change one major thing – how I water the gardens. Watering adequately has been my biggest gardening challenge. We don’t have an in ground sprinkler system. Since we live on a hill of rocks, excess water runs right off the fractured granite more than it soaks down into the ground and the soil dries out very quickly.  This year I’ve watered more often and water more consistently to thoroughly soak every flower bed. If I wait until the clumps of Shasta daisies flop over or the top 2 inches of soil are bone dry, the gardens don’t thrive. They maintain, but they never flower profusely.

Much of what happens in my garden is a lesson. I don’t have to look much farther than myself. Like peonies wilting without sufficient water, I some times wait too long to rehydrate. I become so parched water alone won’t quench my thirst. In the spiritual life, Jesus is the living water of the soul, the essential refreshing, ongoing and outpouring life for us. He is the well in the desert, the fountain head, the pure spring in the rock, the river overflowing into our lives. If the lovely fragile flowers in my earthly garden can’t survive without water, if they only flourish at their best when the roots are deeply soaked, so must the heart’s depths be watered by Jesus, by the Word and by His Holy Spirit welling up inside of us in a rush and a torrent.

In the parable of the “sower and the seed,” Jesus talks about seed which falls on the rocks, by the wayside and on fertile ground. Later He explains to the disciples that the seed is the Word of God which can grow only in good soil. One can only assume that the disciples understood water was essential for the “seed” to grow. When Jesus also spoke of Himself as living water, did they understand He was both?

The mystery and wonder of Jesus is that He always is far more than the disciples – and  “we” understand Him. He is the Word of God recognized and acknowledged by John; paradoxically, Jesus is also the Water of that Word through the Holy Spirit. In Him, through Him and by Him, the Seed falls into us and is thoroughly drenched by His Spirit for abundant and eternal life of God.

All things were made through Him and without Him nothing was made that was made. John 1:3

And this is the testimony: that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. 1.John 5:11

If consistent water produces luxuriant peonies, then consistent life in Jesus through prayer, meditation and study of His Word will grow inner seeds and plants of far greater beauty. When faced with spiritual drought, doubt or weakness, how thoroughly has the soul’s parched roots been watered? With what consistency of the Word and the Spirit has the heart been drenched by Jesus? Too often my spirit is a parched land without water because I’ve waited far too long to spend time with the Lord. He waits and waits for us to come and drink of what is prophesied in Revelation…

“… A pure river of water of life, clear as crystal proceeding from the throne of God and from the Lamb.” Rev 22:1

That life is a glorious future planned for us by God since the beginning. But eternal life has already begun for everyone reborn in Jesus and while still earth bound for a while, we need Word and Water , freely given, to flower into His image, transformed from weeds into “Best of the Show”  Prize Peonies.

Friede