Full Son
It’s garden prep time around our house and yard, and we are yet again faced with the reality that our setup is not built for plants that require full sun to thrive. We have accepted that it’s better to choose to grow what you know will be successful rather than continuing to hope there might somehow be enough sun to produce the tomatoes (when there just never will be).
Shade can still produce good things. It has the essence of light with darker areas. Shade is not complete darkness, therefore, some growth can still happen. The growth just may not be abundant.
The choicest fruits, and usually the sweetest, require full sun exposure for many hours a day.
More desirable fruits require more light.
So it is with our lives.
When we are partially vulnerable, letting people get a small taste of our true inner world, we give them some opportunity to speak into our lives. This can lead to some growth, the kind that thrives in shade.
True, deep, life on life, call each other higher, vulnerability requires a full surrender to bringing all that we are into the light. Our sin, our shame, our failures, all of it, must be brought to the light before chosen community, and more importantly the Lord, in order to see the choicest fruits being produced in our lives.
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. - Galatians 5:22-23
When you truly consider each of these different fruits, it is no small thing to see the Spirit moving in us to produce them. Patience? I must be willing to be humble and bring my pride to the light. The same can be said of each fruit.
Our lives produce the good fruit of the Spirit when we are walking in full SON.
How do we walk in full son? We need Jesus’ life and his work on the cross to cover our lives.
To return to my yard, I can identify two big trees that, if removed, would dramatically change the light exposure of our yard, and thus allow us to grow some of the things we would really like to have success with.
As it stands, we are not going to invest that much to remove the trees. Sometimes, in our lives, we may know what the roadblock is to our growth, but be unwilling to let go of it or surrender it to the Lord.
My challenge to you, today, is to take a good, hard, Spirit-filled look at your life to see what trees or shrubs or rocks might be casting a shadow, creating shade, limiting your growth and ultimately, your ability to fully walk as a child of God. The spiritual investment to remove those things is worth it.
In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. - John 1:4-5
As you create space for more light, Jesus, in your life, may you experience an increase in growth of the fruit of the Spirit.
An abundant harvest awaits.