Digging out the Sin....

Maybe it is the early spring weather or the spring fever of the kids but lately we have been out in the yard more and I have developed a healthy (or unhealthy) obsession with digging up these vines that are connected to these big root ball things, that I call tubers. When I started pulling these vines out of trees, it got to be a joke that I was getting to addicted to digging them out, so much so that Clara asked if we could go outside without mama digging stuff up.

I was pulling ups smallish ones, maybe the biggest was a foot across, but this afternoon I decided to tackle a big one I had noticed in the side yard.

As I dug and dug and dug...

I thought about my life, sin, and how quickly it can take root in your life. How quickly something seemingly small, even pretty on the surface can destroy something great. Like sin, the smilax starts small like this one…

But like neglected smilax or unconfessed sin, it quickly grows and takes root, spreads and begins to send ups outer shoots. Sin as it grows in your life can’t continue to be hidden, it may even grow up to almost look pretty to disguise itself.

Pretty soon smilax, the same as unconfessed sin, sin that I have not asked forgiveness for; sin I am not actively seeking God’s grace and forgiveness for; sin I am not digging out of my heart every day grows like smilax into a huge, hard root with far reaching tentacles that take over my life. It can become so large and overgrown that you may be digging it out over hours, days, weeks or even longer – every day even, you spend time digging it out, pulling up the roots, getting your hands dirty, even running your manicure…

One of the biggest problems with smilax and sin - is it’s favorite place to grow is in the roots of something beautiful. So to get rid of it, you can't take the easy way out, you can’t poison it without risking damaging the beautiful camellia that is it growing under or risking the beautiful creation that God made in you. So you dig and you dig and you yank out giant roots and you are left with a big ugly hole.

One of the best things about God’s grace is that when you confess your sin, when you ask for forgiveness, God give you strength to dig, to even want to dig –not to just cover it up or to pretend it’s a pretty vine. God gets right down there beside you on His knees digging, pulling the roots, watching for little tiny little green shoots right alongside of you. His grace covers all your big ugly holes. He protects your beauty and gives you strength to produce beautiful fruit.

Now during the last few weeks, I have had several gardeners that I know are way smarter than me tell me I am fighting a losing battle. They are right, I will always have a yard with smilax but if I didn’t dig it up, if I didn’t pull up the baby shoots and break up the roots I end up with huge smilax tubers and vines wrapping around the most beautiful things in my yard. Just like sin, if I don’t fight it, battle – pull it up when it is small –then it grows and takes over more and more of my heart and my life. It grows and pushes out all the great stuff God wants for my life.

So right now, I dig – I dig the neglected vines in my yard, I dig at the neglected sin in my heart. As the I dig big and little vines out of my yard, I talk to God and ask Him to come along side to help me to dig out the envy, the comparison, the low self-esteem, the negative self-talk among other things I ask for forgiveness and grace. I ask Him to fill up my deep, ugly holes with love, joy, grace. I ask Him to help peace, friendship and forgiveness to grow in the place of the damaging vines.