Secret Treasures

The first marriage recorded in the Bible took  place in the Garden of Eden.  There is a beautiful and profound truth in this picture --- that is, that God intended our marriage to be treated like a Garden.

I am not one who is very fond of gardening.  My Dad is. His spare time is usually spent outside the house weeding, watering his plants, planting trees, creating garden plots, and other gardening activities I am ignorant of.  If there is no garden, he easily creates one.  When it comes to gardening, my only memory of hands-on experience goes way back to high school at Philippine Christian Gospel School.  

We were required to create our own vegetable plot to plant rows of pechay. We were taught that before you plant anything, you must cultivate the soil.  This means digging up the ground, taking out stones, rocks, weeds, and till up the allotted land for planting.  I pause here to point out its parallelism to marriage.  

Ladies, the moment you decide to tie the knot, you and your spouse must go through a time of "tilling" the ground of your hearts.  This is why we always recommend young couples coming in for pre-marital counseling to go for a session of Inner Healing and Deliverance two or three months ahead of their Big Day.  Before you can plant your heart in your husband's garden, and vice versa, there must be a radical removal of  rocks and stones that are blatantly visible in your heart.  These stones may be issues of unforgiveness, bitterness, resentment and hatred directed against parents or ex-lovers. The rocks may be guilt and shame over past sins of immorality. The weeds may be words of deception and lies about your worth rooted from issues of past betrayals, rejection, or abuse.

Cultivating your garden before you plant is not even an option in the art of gardening.  It is a must if you intend to see fruitfulness in what you sow.  Besides, it is crazy to plant and not expect fruits.  Sadly, many women (and men, for that matter) enter into marriage like farmers deciding to sow rows of corn but not expecting any harvest.  The preparations are mostly spent on the wedding day, rather than in the lifetime journey of marriage.  It is like a farmer counting all the seeds he has his hand, which he is about to sow, celebrating over the amount of it but never putting out his hand once to plow the ground.

Marriage is as intentional as gardening is. Rocks, stones, weeds, are not only hindrances to good fruitfulness, but they choke the life out of any plant sown amidst them.  In order for genuine beauty to come out of your married life, we must be intentional in preparing the ground of our hearts.  Regular cultivation is another story, yet quite as important.

If the ground could talk, it probably would be screaming every time you pull out the rocks embedded in it. Yes, even the initial act of digging down into the soil of our hearts will be painful, but it is a good kind of pain.  It will produce healing and life.  You just have to make sure you are tilling your heart's ground together with the Gardener of all Gardeners --- Jesus Christ.  He knows your soil type very well.  He has the capacity to see way into the depths, beyond the surface of your heart.  He knows which rock to take out first.  He knows which weeds need to be pulled out, and even the best method of pulling them stubborn weeds out.

I encourage you, ladies, go through Inner Healing and Deliverance before you walk down that aisle.  It is available for those who want it. By the way, this 'service' has been paid for so it's free of charge for you. :D