Germination

I believe that every person has the potential to come into a saving relationship with the Lord.  One of the reasons I do is because the Lord has planted a seed of knowledge about Him inside everyone.  Here is an interesting passage from Romans 1:19 "since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20 For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made"

You might say that there is a "seed" of God's knowledge planted in our hearts and with the right conditions that seed can germinate into full life.  It made me think about the process of a seed, which can lay dormant for years in a seed bag but, when placed in the soil and surrounded with the right conditions, becoming an active, living plant.  It turns out that seeds need three basic things to germinate: water, air and temperature.  Water enters the seed and causes it to swell, cracking the shell and activating the starch within to startup the processing of food, stored there for the initial growth stage.  Once the seed is cracked, oxyygen is needed to sustain metabolism (if a seed is waterlogged, the oxygen won't be effective).  Seeds won't germinate unless the temperature is in the right band and interestingly, some seeds won't germinate unless they've been "shocked" by a frost first (other seeds actually need intense heat to help crack the shell...as from a forest fire!).  As we participate in the germination process, we can see that the potential for life can be activated by the water of our love in sincere relationships and the Word of God generating faith to cause shells around hard hearts to crack open.  Often our seeds need some life shocks, like intense cold or heat, just like the plant.  To sustain growth, warmth and light, from fellowship and the truth of God's Word will sustain spiritual development until ultimately our "plant" breaks the surface and finds its complete identity.

 

blessings,

 

Rob Smith

http://2daysthought.blogspot.com/