Advent: Week Two

This last week, my wife and I were thinking back on some of our worst job experiences. Skating Sonic waitress and clean-up crew for a catering business were among my wife's, right next to telemarketer and a brief stint with Texas Bollweevil for me. However, the job that caused me the most initial frustration was the year I spent working in a greenhouse. Besides the fact that I have two purple thumbs, I was constantly annoyed by how slow the process went, how little cultivation and growth seemed to take place from the time a seed was planted to the moment a plant reached full bloom.

You can imagine then, my excitement as I began to see the fruits of my labor, as weeks passed and buds turned into stems and stems gave birth to leaves and flowers. I was elated. I took pride in a job well done. That is, of course, until my boss explained that our job was far from over.

What I had not realized, and was dismayed to discover, was that the plants that looked healthy and vibrant were actually weak and very susceptible to disease. The next step in the process was to pull at leaves that might show spots, denying water to some plants and drowning others. Sometimes, entire flowers would be plucked away; leaves snipped off, as the plants were thoroughly pruned.

When the process ended, what remained was a greenhouse full of sorry looking plants. I could not believe how big a step backward we seemed to have taken, why couldn't we have sold these plants while they were still beautiful? My boss just smiled and said, "give it time".

Sure enough, within a few weeks these leaves and flowers were growing back stronger than ever. They had returned to their original beauty, with the added benefit of being healthier and heartier than they had been before. These plants were made to last. When the next round of plants were set for pruning, the experience seemed a more hopeful one.

As humans, we go through a similar experience. Often we find ourselves in situations that seem ideal, like Job before it all went wrong, like plants before the pruning. Life is as it should be and all is right with the world. And then, without warning, the pruning starts. It takes on a variety of circumstances, sometimes we are picked at, sometimes we are drowning, and sometimes it seems that God's blessings have dried up completely. We look around and wonder, "what was wrong with my life before?" We cry out to God in dismay. And often, God's response is, "give it time".

The writer of Hebrews tells us that "no discipline is pleasant at the time" and we assume that discipline means punishment, God's intervention for things done wrong. This is not always the case. As in the case of Job, it can be God's intervention to make things better or to make us stronger. Note the people in your life who are examples of strength and faithfulness in difficult circumstances. How did they become this way? They would most likely tell you that it was by going through difficult circumstances and enduring them with God's help.

Look how the writer of Hebrews completes this passage on discipline; "Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it". This harvest is not a reference to our ultimate reward, but to Christ's likeness being developed in us every day. The fruit of the Spirit is not something we find, it is something that God nurtures within us, often by pruning at us until we are the kind of people who are patient and gentle and faithful and kind.

As we celebrate this season of advent, we are reminded that the refining that is done on us is done so that we might become who we were always meant to be. That we might be prepared for the coming of the King.