I will always remember my Grandpa Persley, who lived with us years ago and turned our backyard into a lovely and fruitful garden. In essence, he took boards and created a big sandbox and fertilized it regularly with composted topsoil. He made sure that nothing was ever thrown away, even nasty stuff like rotten eggs, coffee grounds, and banana peels, because they could all be used to help the garden grow, and boy, did it ever! He had tomatoes and all kinds of other veggies that got along well…until he and my grandma moved to Springfield. Guess what happened then? Unfortunately, as well-tended as it had been, no one else in our household had the time or the interest to keep that garden healthy, so within three or four weeks, it was completely overrun by weeds; in fact, so swift was the destruction that it made a lasting impression on me.

Friend, your mind is just like that garden. Not only must you tend to your mental and spiritual well-being by planting good seed and cultivating fertile soil, but you must pull out the weeds. In other words, you have to nurture the right kinds of thoughts to yield the best fruit while guarding your mind to prevent the negative and destructive ones from taking root. This means that you have to train yourself and take caution in the friends you keep, the books you read, the media you consume, and the voices that you listen to. Taking in too much negativity will quickly cause thorny, destructive shrubs to sprout up and overtake the robust, healthy, and nourishing crops that come from the Word of God. Tending to your mind takes hard work because it requires “swimming upstream” against culture, but the rich harvest it yields in your life will more than make up for your effort!