I love gardening, and I get anxious to get outside and begin working in the yard while it’s still cool. The other day I managed to survey my flowerbeds to see what needed to be done to start the year. Some dead growth needed to be pruned away and they looked so dry. These flowerbeds were established a few years ago, but this year I realized something new needed to be done. Most of our trees lose their leaves in the fall and spring, and I usually just allow the leaves to stay where they fall in the beds, but now I have started adding a thick extra layer of compost and peat moss to fertilize and keep in the moisture.

Now, this is not a gardening lesson per say, but as I have worked doing the things I have shared above, the Lord talked to me about FOUNDATIONS.

Just as having the right soil foundation for your garden to grow strong roots and beautiful foliage, to be well rounded and balanced people, we also need a strong foundation with the right mix of variables. To support life, plants need good rich soil, water (preferably rain), warmer temperatures and plenty of sunshine.

As believers, you also have basic needs for a long rich life, and these needs can only be met by the Lord God Almighty. Your only desire these days must be to really thrive as a Christian. Being average these days just won’t cut it. Why? Because those very foundations you and I hold so dear are being openly tested now and even threatened (like God sanctioned marriage ONLY between a man and woman), and if you are not STANDING STRONG IN THE LORD AND IN THE POWER OF HIS MIGHT, when put to the test, the foundation you THINK you have may not stand because of the pressure.

You need to be like the man in Luke 6:48 who when he “built a house, and dug deep, and laid the foundation on a rock: and when the flood arose, the stream beat vehemently upon that house, and could not shake it: for it was founded upon a rock.”

Now this rock is not any old rock. In the natural, different stones or rocks have different strengths, and pressure applied to it is a good gauge to go by. YOU NEED JESUS CHRIST AS YOUR FOUNDATION STONE. In Isaiah 28:16 it says, “Behold I lay in Zion for a FOUNDATION a STONE, a TRIED STONE, a PRECIOUS CORNER STONE, a SURE FOUNDATION: he that believeth shall not make haste.”

Not long ago the Lord spoke to me and said, “So many are not rock solid in their faith. Facebook is a social network to hang out and converse, their time needs to be with Me to make firm that foundation. You will find many leaving Facebook to be with Me. First things first.”

You should be somewhere in the building phase of your lives. Maybe you have been a Christian for awhile, maybe you’re a newborn, doesn’t matter, look for weakness or cracks in your foundation and begin repair if need be, repent, and make the changes necessary for Jesus to be that pillar in your life.

It is difficult to digest what’s going on in our world today, and mourning and crying out to God are definitely in order. Look at what Isaiah says in Isaiah 61:3, “to appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give them beauty for ashes, the oil of Joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that He might be glorified.”

~ Celeste Dewey

Celeste Dewey