Growing up, my step dad spent countless hours landscaping and planting in our yard. We had more flowers than you could count, and any time someone came to our house they were immediately in awe of the work he put in to make our yard look amazing. As we have purchased our home in Eau Claire a few years ago I realized I had inherited this love for gardening and landscaping and have found this to be one of my favorite hobbies.
My favorite flower is a fuchsia plant. It’s a beautiful hanging shade plant — I have one hanging off a tree branch in my back yard. The one I bought this year had three different types of the fuchsia flowers and was starting to grow larger than the original container it came in. The flowers were growing, but I could tell they were quickly running out of room and if I was going to allow this plant to reach its full potential this summer I was going to have to transplant it.
Transplanting is tricky. If you do it right the plant will grow and flourish and be all that it was created to be, if you do it wrong you have dead flowers.
This has reminded me so much of our lives with Christ. Recently, we graduated our 4th and 5th grade students leaders in REAL Kids; it was time for me to say “good bye” to our 5th grade students who are now going in to Catalyst Youth. This is always hard for me as I would love to come every Sunday and see those same faces I have watched grow up from newborns, but all things must grow and it was time for them to be transplanted into their new pot of Catalyst Youth Ministry. This will allow their spiritual roots to grow deeper, to be stretched in new and exciting ways and to be firmly rooted and grounded in Christ. Its never easy to send them on as I hope I have done everything for them to have what they need to thrive in their next phase of their spiritual life. Like I said, transplanting is tricky. I pray they will all grow and flourish.
We all need to keep growing, but sometimes we get very comfortable in our “container.” We decide we have grown enough. We have been to enough Bible studies, we have served “our time” helping in different areas, or maybe have just stopped allowing the word of God to challenge our character, our faith and we have not grown in our understanding of who God is to us. There should never be a point in our lives where we think we have the Creator of the Universe figured out or that we know everything we can about scripture. If we are there, we are in the WRONG place. His greatness should always draw us deeper and further into an understanding of how incredible He truly is!
So, maybe you need a larger container. Maybe its time to transplant from the pot you are in to one that has a little more room to grow. Maybe its time to step into the next phase of the call of God on your life. What does this look like? How about instead of just attending a life group, its time to lead one. Or mentoring a teen or young adult in their faith. Join others for Revive the Valley and hit the streets using the spiritual gifts of God in you! You are never done growing. Transplanting is tricky, but the growth is remarkable. By the way, my fuchsia plant is still thriving in its new, BIGGER pot.