Grow in your faith by rooting yourself in God's word
Let your roots grow down into him, and let your lives be built on him. Then your faith will grow strong in the truth you were taught, and you will overflow with thankfulness. – Colossians 2:7 (NLT)
“How can there be this many weeds after just one week?”
Last night, in an effort to kill a few minutes and remove stress before I left for my first ever bunco meet-up (which was absolutely fabulous by the way), I ventured out into my backyard to pull up a few weeds from the lawn. The yard was mowed only six days prior, but thanks to an abundance of evening thunderstorms and sunny afternoons, a massive patch of foot tall weeds taunted me in the exact same spot as they were the week before. As I attempted to dig up a weed with particularly deep roots, I had a thought.
How is it that ugly weeds can root so fast and so deep without anyone helping them, but the beautiful plants and flowers we love have to be planted and tended delicately?
Isn’t it also like that with our faith?
The “weeds” in our lives can grow fast without us even realizing they’re taking root in our hearts; comparison, gossip, resentment, greed, and lust are just a few that come to mind. But the beautiful things that matter such as our faith in God and the call to love others have to be mindfully tended, watered, and pursued in order for them to grow.
For example, I can hear a song one time and remember the beat and some of the lyrics, but I’m known to look up on Wednesday and realize I’ve already forgotten the applicable message from Sunday.
That’s because good things can’t be afterthoughts for care: they have to be tended in our hearts to allow it to take root. We can’t be complacent with our faith and expect it to grow. Day after day, we have to keep chasing after God's Word, praying continuously, and coming back to His will over ours. We're never going to "have it figured out" when it comes to our faith. IT TAKES DAILY WORK!
May our roots grow in the Lord through continuous prayer, gratitude, and the reading and meditation of scripture, and may we continue to evaluate and prune the weeds from our heart that can take root without us even knowing it. Then our faith will grow strong in God’s truth.
Challenge: Get honest with yourself and name the weeds that are growing in your heart that you should be pruning. Add them to your prayer list and ask God to help you pull them. But don't stop there! Do the daily work that will grow your faith in the Lord.
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Jantzen Jolly-Miller is a small business marketing professional and freelance faith writer who is on a mission to help women get real: real with themselves, with their business, and with their relationship with God and His church. In addition to being the lead content writer for Wheat and Honey Co., she blogs about personal takeaways from her life and faith walk to help women create positive change in their everyday routines at JantzenJollyMiller.com
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