Gospel Roots
Digging into my journal recently, I came upon some entries written about a devotional series I was reading on the Bible app way back in 2023, which by the way, is the only way I read scripture these days. Seriously. Several weeks ago my church provided bibles to the entire congregation and I didn’t think twice about not grabbing one. Before I lose my Good Christian Club Card, let me clarify why: I can’t see the words. I mean, I can see them, but they are blurry and hard to read, even with my glasses on and especially in the dim lighting of a Sunday church service. One of the tragic parts of growing older and wiser is losing vision clarity by the decimal point daily. Even after they ordered friendly versions for the “vision impaired” I had to stick to my already established consolation: my iPad and the trusty Holy Bible app.
So, the digital version of God’s word is my preferred way to feast on scripture. And the Bible app contains content beyond innumerable versions of the bible; their devotional library is stout. This particular devotional was called, “Becoming a well-watered woman in a parched world,” by Gretchen Saffles. It was a short, 7-day devotional, built around the idea that what we “water” ourselves with determines the kind of blooming we experience.
Gretchen shares that “your sense of identity has roots–unseen, hidden, yet manifested in how you live.” She provides comparisons of what “rotten roots” versus “gospel roots” look like and which ones you choose to water can determine how you see yourself and ultimately influence the decisions you make for your life.
Reading these scribbles in my journal got me asking again–as I did in 2023–what are my roots grounded in and which do I choose to water? This is what I wrote then and it’s still pretty accurate, as you will notice pretty clearly in any blog post I share about my history.
My rotten roots:
fear of future failure
false words thought/said about me
past trauma/pain
potential and past mistakes
It’s not hard for me to identify what weeds were watered along the way to form these rotten roots. Not too many pages prior to Gretchen’s devotional notes in my journal are arrows drawn across the page titled, “Arrows of Sorrow” and “Arrows of Joy.” They were pictographs; part of an assignment in another study where I drew two timelines belonging to my life, one illustrating memories that brought sorrow and another for those bringing joy. The initial step of the exercise was meant to reveal specific moments in my life that left a strong mark on me; the follow-up step was to identify how those moments–bitter and blissful both–could be used for the good of others in my pathway and for the Glory of God as well.
As you can see from the picture, each timeline had crosspoints labeled with years of age. What’s most striking to me is that from 0-6 years, I can’t recall moments of sorrow at all, even though as I’ve mentioned before, my parents’ marriage was disintegrating during that time in my life. My sister was right, I simply blocked it all out.
I would be lying if I said I hadn’t pondered what is behind the smokescreen of my memory; are there things I can’t “recall” that had a significant impact on my rotten roots growing stronger beneath the surface?
What I can connect to from that time is the blistered feet of the tow-head latchkey kid, gleefully scampering between the country club pool and tennis courts with my companions all summer long. I can remember with great detail tripping over the crude bubbles of blacktop growing between the cracks of concrete at Arlington and my mother coming to my rescue with equal comfort and condemnation over my bloody knees and palms. Such sweet buds of my early childhood that cultivated my love for summertime fun and friendship. The entries further down the arrow labeled, “ Stateland friends, KY/LA Exchange, Chi-O and Farrah” make it pretty obvious that as often as I could, I have chosen to water friendship and community. When prompted to explain why those parts of my life were deemed most “joyful” I wrote this on the next page of my journal:
It’s all about relationships and connecting with others. In college it was my sorority and forming this unique bond with people who were just like me or not like me at all. I learned something from both. Falling in love with my best friend, having my children, becoming an Aunt and most of all my friendship with Farrah—all of those brought joy because they were times when I felt rewarded with CONNECTION. There was struggle and sorrow mixed in, but the overwhelming gift was connection and love.
The birthplace of this blog is proof of my desire to connect and the boundless joy I get from the act of heart exchange between humans. Cue the watering can. I know now that my propensity to find joy in these activities is because they water a gospel root, the one that says, “the most productive thing you can do is to love God and love your neighbor as yourself.” As for other gospel roots? Gretchen offers the following:
When God sees you, he sees his son Jesus Christ, not your failures or mistakes.
Jesus has experienced ultimate hurt/pain. He understands, he listens and he can handle your hurting heart. Bring it to Him.
Your worth isn’t determined by your looks, intelligence, athletic performance. It’s determined by your Savior, and He deemed you worthy enough for him to die on your behalf.
So here I am, asking the question again: How can I be better at watering “gospel roots” instead of the rotten ones? Because the truth is: in the words of Beth Moore, “something is gonna grow.” And I prefer flowers over weeds.
I was asked in that study to write down ways I have watered gospel roots in the past and look for ways to water them in the future. In my journal, I had written these:
Serving pizza lunch to inmates, wrapping Christmas presents for strangers: Matthew 25:40 “Truly I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.”
Singing/leading worship: 1 Peter 4:11 “whoever speaks, as one who speaks oracles of God; whoever serves, as one who serves by the strength that God supplies-in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. To him belong glory and dominion forever and ever.”
Quiet time with scripture/bible study: Phillipians 4:6-7 “do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”
Monday nights on Main: Acts 2:42 “And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.”
Each of those activities listed above are moments I can recall feeling nourished and fed in my spirit. Some seem small in earthly impact, but in hindsight they feel like massive drinks of water that have inevitably quenched this girls’ enormous thirst. I don’t do them because I believe they will earn me treasures in heaven. I don’t do them for extra credit of any sort(there is none to be had cuz He loves us all the same, like all good parents do). I do them because I believe they water the roots that deepen my connection to my Savior, and hopefully make me more like Him.
Because of that, I want more of those. I want more stems to take root in the gospel garden of my heart. Gretchen said it really well at the end of the devotional, “when your roots run deep and your foundation is built on the solid rock of Jesus Christ, the only possible result is a spirit-led flourishing.” Sounds amazing to me.
“so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.”
Ephesians 3:17-19
