tending the garden

Memorial Day weekend. Ah, a three-day weekend replete with about 130 major projects to grade in order to keep ahead of schedule to finish the school year! I brought it all home plus a class magazine we have to have ready for the printer on Tuesday, but the sun and the yard are too inviting. I spent most of Saturday tending my flowers (had planted quite a few a couple of weeks ago) and getting the deck ready to use. All summer I enjoy sitting out on the deck swing or tending to the flowers I plant. Though my green thumb pales to most gardeners, I don't care. Each year I try some new flowers here and there, but have my best luck with hardy impatience, petunias, and geraniums. Not necesarily exotic, but certainly pleasant to the eye.
Parts of the garden and yard are not in the best shape this year due to the fact that with the visit of Daniel's parents, and the hospitalization and death of his dad, very little attention was paid to the outside. We also have some bushes that have been damaged from the heavy weight of snow storms during the last couple of years and we are thinking that they are beyond recuperation and may need to be yanked out.
This reminds we so much of some scripture I have been reading and re-reading lately. Jesus spoke to his disciples often using nature as the basis for his teachings. In John 15 he talked about our relationship to Him as that of parts of a vineyard. Just as in my yard, neglect and distrubing storms can wreck havoc, so it is in our lives unless we are firmly bonded with the vine that supplies our life support.
In looking over that passage there are several 'if's' that are used that we dare not neglect. So often we take our faith or God for granted. But if the garden that is our life is to flourish and be pleasant to the eye it must be tended with great care. We all want to be successful and most of us want to think of ourselves on 'God's side.' However, this scripture passage, makes it clear that there are some precise conditions.
IF a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit.
IF anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers.
IF you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you.
IF you obey my commands, you will remain in my love. (How's that for conditional love?)
IF you do what I command, you are my friends.
I'm about to yank out a couple of bushes, and I hate to do that, but they are distracting from the beauty of the yard. Yanking them out they'll wither and die. But if they serve no positive purpose? How does God see me in the 'garden' of his children? Do I add beauty to the garden? Not if my roots are not firmly grounded can I hope to grow or develop into the healthy Christian I should be. I'll keep working on my outside garden and my internal one.