Prune your suckers…not just in the garden!
Good morning! It is a beautiful sunny morning here, and I’ve been out in the tomato rows pruning suckers. When I first put my tomato plants in the ground, they were too tall, had too thin of stems, and with rain and a cool snap we had they were all turning yellow. I started to worry they may not make it, along with the 400 dahlia tubers I had planted. Then I decided to turn my worries over to the One in charge, and my stress levels went down. The rain ended, the sun came out, we were able to get some fertilizer into our plants, and now they are deep green and growing beautifully!
While I was checking the patch yesterday I noted how large the tomato suckers had gotten, and I had never taken the time to prune the lower leaves off the stems either. So this morning I headed out with a bucket and clippers and started chopping. About a quarter of the way down the first row, a thought popped into my mind. The more I thought about it the more I thought I needed to share the idea. Zach and I often make correlations between life and plants. We can’t help ourselves! So this morning I thought about how our life is like a tomato plant (an indeterminate tomato!). Left to grow at will each branch will develop a sucker that will take off the main stem and grow into a vine as large (or larger) than the main stem. You may end up with a beautiful plant, but one with thin stems and small fruit. However, if you prune your tomato plants, and focus the plant’s energy into growing tall, you will have a nice strong main stem, and your fruits will be large and plentiful. Our lives are very similar. Left unchecked, our attention can be diverted in many different directions; jobs, vacations, busy schedules, sports, hobbies, etc… All of these things can be good, but if we aren’t careful they will lead to small fruits and thin stems in our lives. God has given us a task in this life, and I believe it looks different for each individual. We need to be mindful that we prune our suckers so we focus on what is truly important in our lives.
Personally, I have a lot of pruning that needs done. We have been rearranging just about every room in our house over the past couple of weeks. It has led to disorganization, clutter, and frustration. The end is in sight, and the result will be better than what we started with, but the process is difficult! Through this, however, I’ve noticed that I’ve let some of my suckers grow. In the mess of rearranging, my Bible has been in its normal spot, but the clutter has built up around it making it harder to see in the morning. So I’ve had more mornings pass by without ever picking it up. This is an area I need to focus on and prune, so something that is important to me can be easy to accomplish each day. When my children were all sick with a fever last week, I had so many garden chores that needed done, but I had to prune most of them off for the week to care for what was more important.
Each of us has to decided what is a leaf that is important for the growth of our vine, and what is a sucker that will suck life and energy away. The important thing is that we remind ourselves frequently to prune our vines, and don’t let life get so busy that our suckers become larger than our main stem.
