The conscientious gardener decides what plants and seeds to grow in her garden and then watches over those plants and seeds all season long while they grow and develop into fruit bearing plants. She yanks weeds and eliminates any unwanted plants from growing and competing with her chosen desirable plants.
The same rule applies to what we grow in the garden of thought. We need to watch and be sure that only the “plants and seeds” of God’s goodness take root, develop and bear fruit.
Mary Baker Eddy writes, “Suffer no claim of sin or of sickness to grow upon the thought” (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 390). It’s healthy to ask, “What am I allowing to grow in my thought?” Any images, descriptions, or impressions of disease are invasive weeds that need to be yanked, pronto. They should never be allowed to take root and grow if we don’t want to be harvesting fruit from them later. Only grow in thought what you wish to harvest.
Be a wise gardener, a wise metaphysical gardener! Allow the good ideas of divine Mind to take root in thought, grow and bear fruit, and nothing less. You will bring in a bountiful harvest of health and happiness that way. And you will be very happy with the results.
Thank you, Evan!
What good advice! And the promise of happiness!
May I share https://kencooperpoetry.com/the-gardener-2/ It has the same basic conclusion , – you will be very happy with the results!
Thank you Ken, very lovely and beautifully! ♡
Terrific!
Thanks, Evan!
A great reminder of our personal garden!
Yesterday I testified about our little garden up in our little green space.
. 2 days ago I decided to do some serious cleaning around the bushes.
I thought it would take me less than 1 hour. It took me 4 hours
To complete and still I have to remove some old dirt under the pine trees.
But what a good feeling, I will be able to go there, read, and meditate in an inspiring place. A place I can sit, with fresh air with much cleaner air! Yes, both my gardens, physical and spiritual are starting to sink.
Thank you, Evan for your description, which cannot be clearer and cleaner!
“God’s Will and Predictions About Disease” from The Christian Science Monitor:
https://www.myreadingroom.com/gods-will-and-predictions-about-disease/
Thank you J! ❤️
Thank you Evan for sharing this pure and simple message with us today.❣️
Thanks. Excellent reminder.
I Love this message, along with the photo and added inspired thoughts!
Gardening is a wonderful way to be “present with the Lord” and amongst
all of the beauty and wonder of these blessings of plants, comes the
eternity of hope like dormant flowers just waiting to be renewed, like in
the spring. Plants and flowers, with their gentle petals of God-created
beauty give us a sense of peace and True surroundings of Love and like
plants in our garden, we also grow in our thought, the seeds that we have
planted and with nurturing, acquire the harvest of our thoughts.
Btw – lovely poem, Ken. Thank you for sharing, All.
Thank you for the reminder to lovingly tend our garden of pure God thoughts.
I noticed late on yesterday’s SV on topic of seeing God’s perfect man and the analogy of a perfect circle, Amy asked a question that probably most of us did not see. I repeat it here for anyone who would like to share a thought or inspiration.
She said:
“Thank you, Evan, I was taught that this is different from visualization, but I have to admit that I struggle to see how to see in this way without it feeling like visualization.” She later added, ”I think I’m asking how to not visualize, but to know.”
Are we using visualization in an “I knowing” or in a “knowing I” way? As I heard in a testimony once, “I do not see because I have eyes, I have eyes because I see.” (I’m sorry but I do not recall other details of the article but it was about a beautiful healing of loss of vision.) Could using an inspired visual metaphor to help “see” God’s perception of perfection in perfect Man be anything but knowing the Truth? Could this be any different than looking at a beautiful rose and appreciating God’s creation? If the goal steadfastly remains to let thought yield to Truth (versus erroneously trying to influence matter), then can’t only spiritual sense be present, no matter whether it is named “seeing” or “knowing”?
Thank you Rose and Amy for helping us/me to delve more into this very
good question. The way I understand it, vision- that is, seeing, is one
of the 5 material senses. We know that these can be falsely showing us a
sense of reality that is not really real. For example a mirage in the road
that looks like water or train tracks converging off in a distance, when in
reality they are still parallel.
In trying to interpret what Mrs. Eddy has shared with us in her writings,
“Spiritual man’s substantiality transcend mortal vision and is revealed
only through divine Science” (S&H, pg 301). She also writes, (pg.71),
“Close your eyes, and you may dream that you see a flower, – that you
touch and smell it. Thus you learn that the flower is a product of the
so-called mind, a formation of [Thought] rather than of matter. Close your
eyes again, and you may see landscapes, men, and women. Thus you learn
that these also are images, which mortal mind holds and evolves and
which simulate mind, life and intelligence. From dreams also you learn that
neither mortal mind nor matter is the image or likeness of God, and that
immortal Mind in not [in] matter”. Mrs. Eddy also writes more about vision
on pages 572 and beyond where she writes about St. John’s vision of a
new heaven and earth … “Not through the material visual organs for seeing,
for optics are inadequate to take in so wonderful a scene. Were this new
heaven and new earth terrestrial or celestial, material or spiritual? They
could not be the former, for the human sense of space is unable to grasp
such a view. The Revelator was on our plane of existence, while yet beholding
what the eye can not see, – that which is invisible to the uninspired thought”.
Also, Mrs. Eddy’s definition of Eye: A beginning; mortality; that which does not
last forever; a finite belief concerning life, substance, and intelligence in matter;
error; the belief that the human race originated materially instead of spiritually, –
that man started first from dust, second from a rib, and third from an egg.”
Concepts, we think in concepts.
Concepts dependent upon the 5 senses.
Your concept of a tree, or a concern can be different from mine, and often is. We pollute unknowingly based upon concepts.
Resting in stillness, awaiting the still small voice to inform our actions is spiritual activity for spiritual activity.
Thank you Angel, for this thoughtful reply. In reading what you wrote, I gained some new insight but feel that I have reached the current limit of my understanding to comment further 🙂 . I look forward to reading what ideas others might have to share.
Thank you for revisited Amy’s comments. I was also waiting to see the responses. I think “holding thought steadfastly to the enduring, the good and the true ” or “seeing the perfect model” is a kind of visualization but it has the conviction,or the thought, behind it that God is lovingly and completely governing this (what we are visualizing) and every aspect of our lives. Am I on the right track or is it more complicated than that?
But you are seeing the circle as a concept , an idea . That’s how have interpreted this beautiful idea
Any other thoughts ?
Great reply’s. Thank you for giving more food for thought.
Thank you Evan for this gardening subject and all the comments. Got to get busy weeding.
Thank you! Just what I needed!