Are you reaching the fullness of your destiny? It’s a question that takes equal parts of thought and prayer — thought that comes during prayer, when the Holy Spirit illuminates us.
For He knows your status. He knows if you’re getting what you should out of life. He knows you as you don’t and can’t. And He knows how you’re rooted. He knows your “soil” — the base from which you spring in Spring or fall in autumn (to mix metaphors).
“You are a seed,” noted one preacher. “You are full of gifts, talents, and potential. But if you plant yourself in unhealthy soil, if you hang around friends who compromise and pull you down, if you’re in an environment with limited mind-sets, where people tell you what you can’t do and how you’ll never accomplish your dreams, you won’t see the growth you should. It’s not because there’s something wrong with your seed—you are made in the image of God. The problem is with the soil. The thorns, the weeds, and the rocks are choking the life out of your seed—your dreams, your vision, and your character.”
1 Corinthians: 15:33: “Do not be deceived: ‘Bad company ruins good morals.’”
Proverbs 22:23-34: “Make no friendship with a man given to anger, nor go with a wrathful man, lest you learn his ways and entangle yourself in a snare.”
The point is: we have to be selective — discerning — when it comes to who we should journey with, who we should give our time and energy to — plant our “selves” with.
You don’t want to be yoked with those who sap your stamina, your optimism, your sense of well-being, who divert you from your mission.
When we’re around the wrong person, there are fizzles, sparks, sometimes fire. Our “hard-disc drive” can fail (from the wrong surge). You feel differently about yourself according to who you’re with.
Don’t force yourself to be in the presence for too long of those who make you feel less about yourself, or unsteady, unstable, uncertain, inferior, dominated, negative. Don’t get short-circuited. “And the seed whose fruit is righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace,” teaches James 3:18. “For thus says the Lord…’Break up your fallow ground. And do not sow among thorns'” (Jeremiah 4:3-4).
Ask yourself where your self-image formed: in your mirror or in the eyes of others.
Now, there are some folks we have to be around; in these cases, we offer up what we must; we endure for the sake of love. But, we do not allow others to crush us — to shove us into darkness.
Remove the hardness. Remove what is infertile. Remove what detracts from your kindness. Go where the Son rises. Remove the gravel and pebbles and stones and rocks — perhaps boulders — of bitterness, arrogance, jealousy, resentment. The richest soil was at the foot of the Cross.
“If your friends are prejudiced,” noted the preacher, “you’re going to become prejudiced. If they have no goals and little motivation, that narrow-minded thinking is going to contaminate you. You will become like the people with whom you associate. It’s time to pull up the weeds and thorns that are causing you to shrivel up. Be nice to everyone, but don’t spend time with negative, critical, jealous, small-minded, bitter people.
“God has given you a gift that will flourish and grow in good soil. Your seed is full of potential, your seed has greatness in it, your seed can set a new standard for your family, your seed can break generational curses, your seed could have the cure for cancer, your seed could impact this world. What God has entrusted you with is extremely valuable.
“Do your part and keep your seed… in good soil.”
Faith is the fertilizer.
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