Rose Garden

A couple of weeks ago I visited the Rose Garden in Portland, OR. It is located just a short distance from downtown and covers several acres of terraced gardens on a hillside. The Garden was a riot of color and there must have been hundreds of varieties with some sections of same color roses and other sections with a mix of all colors. There were “walls” of roses, arches of roses, carefully created designs using roses, and some spots where it seemed they just planted the roses and let them bloom together as they pleased.

On the “Whimsical, Eclectic, Walkway” near the barn down on the farm, my bride and I have about 15 or 20 roses bushes. They are just stuck in the ground in a semi-circular (sorta) line that follows the path and are mixed with other kinds of flowers and plants. There are several varieties there as well, but they are single plants and don’t look at all like the roses in Portland. Of course we are not far from the Tyler rose garden, but I have yet to visit it when it is in bloom.

I have this feeling it will not look the same as mine either. I know the soil on my walkway is not what it ought to be, I seldom feed them, water them spasmodically, have no ideal how to “prune” them, and they tend to look. . .well, weak, spindly, and while they do produce roses on occasion, they don’t seem up to the task. Please don’t tell me it is “my fault.” The Missus has already done that sufficiently.

I think, perhaps, rose gardens are like Churches. Some have the right “stuff,” in which to grow mature, productive Believers. The Truth (food) is always present, the Water of Life is abundant, and the “caretakers” know what they are doing and understand how to work the “soil” to obtain the correct result.

Other “Churches” are mired in mixed messages, almost no real Truth, and there is a dearth of “living water.” The folks are too busy with other pursuits, and have little time for the teaching, pruning, training, lloving work that is required to fulfill the Master’s design for his “garden.”

I have been thinking about taking some “rose growing” (??) lessons.

Maybe you need to make sure you are part of a “Church” that knows how to grow Believers into the maturity that conforms them to the image of the Master Gardner. (See Romans 8: 28-29)