Mind Gardening

N.T. Wright writes the following passage:

Paul doesn’t see these hymns and songs as simply decorative, a pleasant aural embroidery around Christian faith and practice. Singing, whether aloud or in your heart , was, he thought, an excellent way of actually practicing the faith. If you don’t want your garden to grow weeds, one of the best ways is to keep it well stocked with strong, sturdy flowers and shrubs. (2002, p. 63)

Gardening the Mind

I have often thought of how much the mind is like a garden. You have to work to make sure it is productive, prepare the soil by pulling the weeds, plant seeds you want to grow whether flowers or vegetables, and you have to nurture or fertilize the garden. In order to have a thriving garden you need to prepare the soil by pulling the weeds and clearing a spot to welcome the seeds. Our minds are very much the same because we can have weeds in our minds which are negative thoughts or habits that do not serve us well. Negative self-talk negatively impacts our self-esteem and continuing to have negative thoughts simply fuels one’s low self-esteem.

Plantings Seeds to Produce

As a Christian I have chosen to plant the seed by accepting Christ as my Savior and accepting the Holy Spirit into my soul. This “seed” is like the seed of a beautiful flower. It’s a simple seed that with the correct nurturing can bloom into a beautiful bouquet or without nurturing with fail to thrive and simply shrivel up and lie dormant.

Nurturing the Seed

As a gardener you have a choice of how to fertilize the garden. Today there are organic options or traditional chemical options. The purpose of fertilize is to enrich the soil, providing needed nutrients to help the seed produce at its highest level. If you ignore the need to nurture the seed the weeds will become overgrown and choke the seed. No matter how much the seed wants to produce if it isn’t nurtured the weeds can choke and steal the valuable nutrients from the soil and leave the seed unhealthy. With nurturing, fertilizer the weeds are killed off and the seed produces its blooms over and over. The mind is the same way, if we constantly fill our minds with thoughts that are “impure” as Paul notes, our the “bad” side of the human will can choke the fruit from coming to its highest yield. However if we fill our minds with positivity, kindness, and focus on the Lord, we can produce our at highest level.

Based upon this weeks reading, Ephesians 5: 1-20, Paul provides guidelines for living in a way that nurtures the seed of the Holy Spirit and for behaving in a way that brings blessings to others. Of the types of behavior that will allow weeds to grow and choke the positive fruit of the Holy Spirit, Paul writes that these behaviors are: sexual immorality, or of any kind of impurity, or of greed, obscenity, foolish talk or coarse joking. To bring forth fruit and hold back weeds, Paul writes that as a Christian we should “speak to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. Sing and make music in your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.”