Tend to You

You know, we’ve all learned the hard way… We plant that beautiful flower we saw at the garden store and within weeks that poor thing has withered. We got busy and forgot to water it. We didn’t give it the proper soil with nutrients for growth. We planted it in the sun and it got scorched. Name a way a person has killed a plant and chances are, we’ve all done it.

The hardest part about growing something is not planting it; it’s tending to it. The same is true for us. We often know the thing we want to grow in our life. We know we want to grow our friendships or we want to grow in God’s word. Some of us want to grow our physical endurance or we want to grow our intellectual mind. Some of us want to grow our knowledge around social justice issues and some of us want to grow in our marriages. The easiest part of growing is recognizing what you want to grow. The hardest part is tending to that growth.

So often we tend to everyone else but ourselves. We make our kids‘ doctor appointments but not our own. We pack their lunches but come up empty-handed for ours. We plan birthday parties for other people and then let our special day come and go. We encourage other people in their walks with God but get too busy for our own. We hand out marriage advice like “make date night a priority” or “tell him how you feel” and yet we fail to live out our own advice. We are women who are constantly attending to others and though that is awesome and beautiful and kind, it can also find us with little energy left to tend to ourselves.

Tending to growth requires attention. You can’t accomplish your goals to grow if you don’t attend to the very thing you want to grow. Around here at Collide, we hope you are growing in your relationship with Jesus, and that too requires tending. Some great questions to reflect on this week as you challenge yourself to attend to your spiritual growth are: Is the amount of time I am tending to my relationship with God aligning with how highly I value it? What can I do this week to water my walk with Jesus? Is there anything that is scorching my walk with God, and if so, how can I replant myself in a more nutrient-rich place?

Sometimes the best way to tend to our growth is to start with where we’re at. I hope that these reflection questions help you take stock of where you are right now. I also invite you to check out all the resources, programs, and ministry we have to help you collide with our beautiful Jesus. The more you collide with Him, the more you experience Him tending to you and all that He is growing in you. And isn’t that what is so so great about our God? He is always tending to us, wanting our best, growing in us more and more who we are meant to be, at our beck and call wanting to spend time in our presence. Spend time with the One who wants to tend to your heart, your soul, your mind, and your strength. The more time you allow Him to tend to you, the more you will be like a well-watered plant, flourishing, nutrient-rich, and blossoming for all to admire.