All of these photos were taken several years
ago before the thick trees surrounding the
back and one side of the garden were removed.
It looks different today.
Sadly the privacy is gone
that made this bird
sanctuary into
a secret
garden.
Sometimes during warm summer evenings we would worship outside so we could enjoy
the fragrance of the flowers and listen
to the chatter of birds settling
down for the night.
Oh Hazel, these pictures are beautiful.:)
ReplyDeleteThe hedge is gone, the garden no longer secret. But still a sanctuary for birds.
ReplyDeleteWhat new phase is coming (and has come) for the garden? What new shape shall she take as her Lord cultivates her?
As beautiful as she once was, He has changed her to make her even more beautiful.
The hedge that once protected her beauty could not stay forever, because He did not forever want her beauty to be hidden. Had it stayed, it would have become destruction to her.
So He removed it and put her in the sun. There new flowers will bloom, and new birds and animals will come for shelter -- not only shelter in the shade, but shelter in the Son.
And now her fragrance must spread abroad. His fragrance in her must spread abroad.
She is His, and He takes her from glory to glory, ever-increasing. What once had glory in her garden then has no comparsion to the surpassing glory of the Son shining on and in her now and in the days to come.
"I am a garden fountain,
a well of flowing water
streaming down from Lebanon.
Awake, north wind,
and come, south wind!
Blow on my garden,
that its fragrance may spread abroad.
Let my Lover come into His garden
and taste its choice fruits."
(Song 4:14-15)
"I will plant her for Myself in the land;
[Through her] I will show My love
to the one called 'not my loved one',
[Through her] I will say
to those called 'not my people',
'You are My people';
and they will say, 'You are my God'."
(Hosea 2:23, adapted)
Ramone,
ReplyDeleteYour comments bear witness in my spirit that God is speaking through them! They brought great encouragment to me to not focus so much on what I can see in the natural, but to what He is doing in the supernatural... The protective hedge I had built around myself in order to protect my heart from further pain has been removed by His love. I must trust Him to protect me and rest in His Sovereign love... Does that make sense?
In Him,
Hazel
Yes! It became obvious as I was writing that I was writing about your garden and about you. Somehow your paths are parallel! (^_^)
ReplyDelete