Good morning,
From the time of our new birth God has been making our wilderness into the garden of Eden. He has been doing an extreme makeover in our lives. "For the Lord will comfort Zion; He will comfort all her waste places. And He will make her wilderness like Eden, and her desert like the garden of the Lord. Joy and gladness will be found in her, thanksgiving and the voice of song or instrument of praise". (Is. 51:3) In the garden of Eden, Adam and Eve walked and talked with God in the cool of the day. They had an intimate relationship, that is what God desires from us in His garden of Eden within. We have the same choices as Adam and Eve did in the garden of Eden, we can serve God and pay no attention to the devil and our end will be entirely different. Allow God to be God and do His tending in us. Wilderness means uncultivated, pathless, or barren, confusing mass of something, confusion, or desert waste. Eden means pleasure and delight. God has been turning and will continue to turn our mass of confusion into a place of delight and pleasure. Our soul is God's garden that He is involved in restoring, He is working with us to bring about peace and beauty. "Therefore they shall come and sing in the height of Zion, and shall flow together to the goodness of the Lord, for wheat, and for wine, and for oil, and for the young of the flock and of the herd: and their soul shall be as a watered garden; and they shall not sorrow any more at all." (Jer. 31:12) Watered garden means steeped in moisture, saturated, completely penetrated, a garden is an enclosure, "figuratively of a bride"' a cultivated area (prepared, loosened; breaking up of the hard ground for the purpose of killing weeds and modifying moisture retention.
God waters and weeds His garden (our soul) as we renew our mind with the Word of God. Ephesians 5:26; "So that He [Christ] might sanctify her [the Church], having cleansed her by the washing of water with the Word." John refers to this as he talks about us producing much better fruit in the garden. "I am the True Vine, and My Father is the Vinedresser. Any branch in Me that does not bear fruit [that stops bearing] He cuts away (trims off, takes away); and He cleanses and repeatedly prunes every branch that continues to bear fruit, to make it bear more and richer and more excellent fruit. You are cleansed and pruned already, because of the word which I have given you [the teachings I have discussed with you]." (John 15:1-3) God is always cleaning and pruning in our garden in order to change the uncultivated area into a cultivated one. We are like a bride being prepared and ready for her King. Our Vinedresser is using everything in our life to prune and cut away the dead and unfruitful things that have grown in our lives. Pruning is to bring rejuvenation, it involves cutting back, deadheading and pinching. Cutting back is when older leaves start looking worn, you can cut it back to where there is fresh growth or all the way back. Sometimes you cut back when a plant grows too tall to support itself and encourage the plant to become more stockier; more blooms and stems. Deadheading is removing things that once bloomed but are now dead; removing the dead will cause new blooms. Every plant benefits from deadheading because the plants put their energy into strengthening itself. Pinching is done more often than deadheading, like every 2 to 3 weeks. It is done by using your fingers, it is not as forceful as the other methods, yet it also produces a more fuller plant. Sounds like pruning is all for our good to get us to produce better, fuller, stockier blooms, and to remove all dead things to make room for the new! Let's yield to the hands of the One Who tends our garden. It may hurt or be uncomfortable, but since we know He loves us, we can trust His pinching, deadheading, and cutting back is actions of love.
Love,
Pastor D.
Daughters of Z 
nice article
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