Putting Down Some Roots

Friendship Park, San Pedro. Taken September 30, 2015

I’ve never been very good with plants. Jim used to tease me when after 2 weeks, a houseplant I’d purchased was brown and wilted. If we wanted to have plants in our home, we’d have to make it part of the monthly budget. I’ve always been a plant killer.

However, three moves and three countries ago, I developed a longing for a garden. 

I was more like a compulsion. 

I wanted to be a part of the process of seeing fruit come from plants that had grown from seeds or seedlings I had planted. And for some reason, the plants I started in my styrofoam grocer boxes flourished. I passed my year old Malaysian garden on to a homeschooling family I had met there when we moved. They were thrilled, I felt like I was giving a child up for adoption.

They are just plants. Weird. I would ask the Lord why my heart had this new love that followed me to the the USA one year ago when we came back for a year’s Sabbatical. Doesn’t the putting around in a garden distract me from the work of ministry? Spending time with people? Writing an encouraging note? Preparing a Bible Study? What’s with this hunger to put my hands in dirt and see things grow? I took some birthday money and bought pots for our San Pedro balcony and started another garden, thrilled that in this small space I had 27 varieties of seasonal plants.

Deep down, I knew what was behind it. And even as I write I know, but I am reluctant to tell. 

I want to put some roots down. After 11 moves in 4 countries, in 18 years. I dream of sitting under a mature tree that I’ve seen grow. Perhaps part of it is that I’m starting to have a subtle symbolic reaction to pulling up roots from the hard fought depth of relationships we had cultivated there. Perhaps it’s that I’m coming out of denial about what it means to be an empty nester, my role of cultivating those little seedling boys of ours is over and they are off somewhere else becoming mighty oaks.

So. Here we are. Exactly 12 months into a one year Sabbatical and I feel like we’ve only just started here. Coming alongside aging parents who have suffered a lot of loneliness because we made a choice 18 years ago to move to Asia. Coming alongside women who need encouragement as they step into ministry roles, or are disempowered by the glass ceiling for strong women in evangelical churches. Coming alongside a couple of at-risk teenagers who need an auntie mentor. Coming alongside a team at our sending church who is planning next years Missions Conference. For years I’ve had a blog about Blooming Where I’m Planted. This year has been no exception. 

I suppose we have to be making plans to move on. While both Jim and I now sense God has confirmed we need to be in the USA for a season, primarily for our parents’, Jim still feels strongly about continuing his investment in the Christian leaders in Asia. 

I could go anywhere. 

But I’d prefer it to be where I could put down some roots.