The Hem

                                          

Steve surprised me a couple of days ago and got me four allamanda bushes.  I have wanted some, because I can remember vividly the beautiful allamanda bushes in my grandmother's front yard.  The faint smell of the delicate yellow leaves unneduately transport me back in time to 1968...

Anyway, he surprised me by buying them.  We had wanted to redo the front flowerbed.  It always seemed to be so messy.  Between the mulch and the scraggily firecracker plant leaves...it left the front walkway looking unkempt. 

He dug up the firecrackers, cleaned up the old mulch, and planted the allamandas.  He then placed a raised border around the walkway and remulched it. 

What a difference the border made!  It kept all of the mulch from spilling out onto the walk, and defined the flowerbed.  It's funny how one little thing like a boundry can make such a huge change.

Boundries.  We set them all of the time.  But did you know that God sets boundries for US?  David tells us in Psalm 139:

O Lord, you have searched me and you know me. You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways. Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely, O Lord. You hem me in—behind and before; you have laid your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain.            Psalm 139:1-6

God knows us inside and out.  There is nothing that we can do or think, that He doesn't know about. He has searched us.  Kind of like an internal Google...He searches me and knows all about me.  He knows what we're thinking...uh oh.   It is almost unfathomable that He knows what we're going to say, before we do!  Kind of makes you cringe sometimes, doesn't it?

He "hems us in"  behind and before.  By placing His Hand on us, He keeps us anchored in our place.  Like those plants, without a 'hedge of protection' around us, our lives can tend to be messy....all over the place.  When we are in God's Will, we are surrounded by the boundries He has set around us...to keep us safe and free from danger.  Staying within the boundry also helps define us as Christians.

Like those plants...some of our 'growth' can get out of hand...and sneak out of the cracks in the boundries.  We have to be vigilant, in spotting the weeds before they get too big, and plugging the holes or cracks up, to keep us close to Him.  Like the boundries that we set for our children, in order to keep them safe...He sets boundries for US, for our protection.  He doesn't give us boundries to stop us from having fun...it is for our future security.

It IS too wonderful for us to understand...how the Creator of the universe cares enough about each of us, personally enough to know about every minute detail of our life...and not only knows....but cares. 

Thank you, God for caring enough about our Eternal future, by sending us your Son.  May we show You how much we care, by living our lives for You.