I’m sitting in our garden writing this blogpost. The sun is going down and the kids are playing on our trampoline. I can not complain about our garden, its nice and I love it. We have tomatoes, peppers, strawberries and all other kind of things. Later we are going to eat rhubarb desert, fresh from our garden.

What we have in our garden will reflect us, because nothing comes out of nothing.

I didn’t just go out one day and find everything already there. No, I needed to prepare the soil, plant the seeds and give water. These days we need to prune and weed. When I sit in my chair and look at it, I can say it looks good.

It’s the same with our jobs and ministries; nothing is done by itself. It’s hard work and lots of hours. When we built the com

munity here in Constanta, it took long hours and hard work. Today it’s still long hours and hard work, but in a different way.

What I learned is that we cant expect things to be great on the first try, we need to try over and over again. So if you are starting something don’t think you will have it straight away, the norm is that it takes time and trying out before you get the good results.

What do you have in your garden? I know what we have in ours. Some plants needs more sun, they are in the sun. Some needs more shade and they are in the shade.
Some need more pruning, I prune them. Some don’t handle the winter, so I cover them in the winter time.

This is what leadership is all about as well. To know what you have in your garden and to work with it. Leading something means that you need to work with it, you need to know it and you need to pay attention to it. And as we plant in our garden, some will grow big and nice, and some will not. Some will grow out of it’s space and I need to move it. A tree I had, a walnut tree, grew so big that we needed to dig it up and move it to a bigger garden- It did not fit in our garden. Or like my fig tree, that froze last winter, and I needed to cut it down, but now its coming from the ground again. When I succeed in my garden is when I have plants that have enough room and are growing steadily, and I can take cuttings and put them in the soil to multiply. Then I love it.

I hope your garden is blooming and growing, and that you enjoy it, and that you have enough to be able to give away and I hope it’s the same in your life and ministry.

‘Til next time – create gardens,

Rune Sæther