Grace and Gardening

This past summer my children attended a daily Bible camp with the local Calvary Chapel where they were given a direct opportunity to experience another perspective on Christianity. It was fun and very basic for them and each night we had many good things to discuss as the children recognized for themselves deep similarities and significant differences in the manner in which we worship our Heavenly Father and teach about the gift of his Son, Jesus Christ. After the third day, when gathered around the dinner table the children began to explain that they had learned much about grace and that by accepting Jesus we can be saved. This sparked an important discussion around the table that led to an interesting metaphor about gardening that helped me explain to my children that we are saved by grace after all we can do. It is important in this discussion to point out that the Grace of Jesus Christ really is the most important component of our salvation, but it is not the only component. As self-governing agents who are endowed with the capacity to act and not just be acted upon, our own will and actions play a tremendously important role in our salvation.

Grace is the Most Important Component…

We are utterly lost without a Savior. Furthermore, the blessings of the infinite atonement are gifts that enable us in this life bringing blessings of peace, comfort, understanding, and strength to repent and live after the manner of happiness. This is why we give ourselves to the service of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. We are nothing without the Lord, period.

The priceless atonement brings profound blessings in this life and will eventually draw us back into the presence of the Father. It provides us with an immortal body in the next life and gives us an opportunity to repent of our sins in this one. Having said this, our progress toward exaltation requires important personal components such as good works and covenants. This is the part WE are responsible for. There will be no grand checklist at the great judgment day that the Master will go down and measure everyone against with blind judgment. We will see how strikingly like or dislike the Lord we have BECOME through the application of the atonement, good works and covenant living and our judgment will be straightforward and prefect (for light cleaveth unto light). The whole point of the gospel of Jesus Christ is that it make something of us. Not simply give us something to do.

Gifts of Grace as Compared to the Sun, Water, Soil , and Breath of Life

Consider the garden I helped plant this past summer. With a good neighbor, Bro. Harper, we cleared land of junk, stones, debris, stones, wood, stones, bricks, more stones, and even more stones. Then we tilled the land and cleared away another fresh batch of stones. We mixed sand and mulch into the rock and clay and fertilized the soil for optimal growth. We cleared rows and planted seeds all with the hopes that our garden would someday become something beautiful. Having done all this we both understand that without the gift of the sun (Son), access to water, soil and the breath of life given the seeds by a God in the heavens our attempts at a garden would be futile. All of these things have been provided by the grace of a beneficent Father. The sun, in particular, is given freely as a gift to all of us, bond or free, male or female, rich or poor, black or white, old or young and serves as a component that all gardeners depend upon for a healthy harvest.  It would not matter how many good works our garden received if there were no sun shining down upon it, enabling it to grow.

Other Gifts Offered

While not offered freely to all, like the sun, the other necessary foundational components of gardening are accessible. We must have soil and water. Wemust nourish the soil and take advantage of that water supply or our poor garden will dry up and wither to nothingness. I compare these to the blessings of the gospel and covenants. Once these are secured, then it falls to our own efforts to maintain, nourish, weed, and protect our garden that it may become fruitful.

With All the Gifts We Have Been Offered...

The Lord asks us to make something of our existence. He commands us to be perfect even as he and our Father in Heaven are perfect. He asks us to work hard and do much good. He offers to us the enabling gift of the atonement (sun). He grants us access to the truth, essential covenants and ordinances required for eternal growth unto godhood (soil and water). He offers us the fertilizing gift of the Holy Ghost. He gives us time and offers us correction and repentance. The rest is up to us. We determine which vegetables are grown by the seeds we sow (influences we willingly let into our life). We determine whether our life is a bounteous garden or a weed patch by how well we nurture godly habits or let the natural man overrun us. When all is said and done we will be judged by what we have BECOME. Becoming great requires habits of holiness. Without the gifts of the atonement wrought by the Son, the empowering assistance of the Holy Ghost, truth, or covenants made available by the Father we would be left to our own devices without sun, soil, water, or fertilizing nutrients and all our work would be for naught. But glory be to the Father above, for he has provided the means whereby we may be saved and exalted in courts on high for we ARE saved by grace... after all we can do.