March, 1937
T H E K I N G ' S B U S I N E S S
91
Junior King's Business By MARTHA S. HOOKER /
AN EASTER GARDEN B r H elen F razee -B ower
T he long rays of the setting sun were reaching like fingers through the hedge, and making strange shad ows beyond the garden gate, before Mother realized it. They had been so happily absorbed all the afternoon that neither she nor the children had noticed how quickly the time passed. “A garden is such an interesting place to lose one’s self in,” she murmured. “And haven’t we had a good time? I can just see how it will all look. Over there, against the wall, the hollyhocks that Danny has planted— sturdy and straight they will be as the little legs that carried water to fill the holes where we planted them. Bless his heart! And here in this corner, Little Sister’s larkspurs. (She looks like a lark spur herself in that blue frock.) And the pansy-bed— I couldn’t fancy a garden with out pansies. Baby faces they are, and I’ll never look at this particular bed but I’ll see Baby himself the way he lifted those big brown eyes to me, and laughed when the butterfly came so near . . . Oh, dear, I guess we’ll have to stop—it will soon be time to think of something to eat. Come Danny, come Sister,” she called, and, pick ing up the baby, she went and sat down on the front step. Around the corner came the two children, Danny’s hands grimy from the afternoon’s toil, and a smudge across Sister’s nose. They dropped to the step beside her. “Let’s have a story, Mother, before we go in—just one little story, please.” The eagerness in their eyes was hard to resist. “Well, just one, for it is almost time for Father. How would you like a garden story ?” “ Oh, that would be fine,” said Danny. “ I think a garden is the nicest place in the world,” added Sister. “ I wonder whether you know what day is coming soon,” Mother began. “ Oh, yes, Easter!” “And why do we have Easter?” “ I know,” cried Sister. “T o wear my silk dress!” “Me know,” lisped Baby. “Bunnies.” Mother kissed the corner of his mouth where the dimple began. “ Neither of you is quite right,” she said. Danny lifted serious eyes to hers and said, “That’s not Easter, really, is it, Mother? Easter is to remember Christ when He came from the grave.” “That’s right, Danny. On Easter, we re member that glad day when the Lord Jesus arose from the dead. And since we have been making gardens all afternoon, would you like to learn how to make an Easter garden now?” “ Is an Easter garden any different from the other kind?” asked Sister.
“ Yes, indeed,” replied Mother. “An Eas ter garden is the most beautiful garden of all, and it has to be made in a very special way. Now I’ll tell you . . . “T o make an Easter garden
“There are several good ones, Danny, but the one I like best is ‘God is faithful.’ That just seems to get around every old weed and fake it out by the roots.” “Watering the seeds is our Bible reading and worship-time, isn’t it, Mother?” asked Little Sister. “ Yes, dear, and let’s never forget that no matter how good the seed is that we plant, it won’t grow without water. Just like the real seeds that we planted today.” “ There’s one part that sounds queer to me, Mother,” said Danny. “What is that, Son?” “Well, that part about the blossom being Christ the risen Lord. I never heard the Lord called a flower before.” Mother did not answer but began to hum softly the chorus, “He’s the Lily of the Val ley” and drifted into the music of “The Rose of Sharon.” She watched the slow twinkle deepen in Danny’s eyes as she quoted the verse, “ I am the rose of Sharon, and the lily of the valleys.” “ I take it all back, Mother,” he said. “ I have heard Him called a flower, but I never thought about it, I guess.” “Well, I think about it many times,” said Mother. “Because I love flowers so much, I think about it almost every time I look at one. Why shouldn’t the Lord be like the loveliest things He has made? And didn’t He come out of a garden on that first resur rection morning?” “Why, so He did !” the children cried. “We never thought about that.” “That’s a good story, Mother,” said Lit tle Sister. “ I think I like that better than the larkspurs, even.” “When you water your larkspurs, think about it sometimes,” said Mother. “But, dear, dear, look where the sun is! I’ll have to start Father’s dinner. Come, Sister, and feed the baby his apple sauce.” The three went into the house, but Danny sat on in the dusk. He watched the long shadows grow longer and the twilight deepen in the quiet sky, and, like the shadows and the twilight, his thoughts grew long and deep, too. “Mother’s fine,” he mused. “ She knows things—things that get you somehow. Like that Easter garden. All my life I have thought I wanted to plant things, but I guess I really never knew what I wanted to plant before. But I know now. I want to plant for God. I want to help the Easter flower to grow in everybody’s heart—the blossom that is Christ the risen Lord.” The light faded from the evening sky, and dark ness took the garden, but on the little boy’s face was another light—the light of a great resolve.
The seeds of faith you sow, You press the soil about them And then you take the hoe And pull the weeds of doubting, Then water with the Word . . .
The blossom, born at Easter, Is Christ, the risen Lord.” “Why, it’s a poem!” the children cried, and clapped their hands with delight. “ Yes, it’s a poem, but it’s the truth, too,” said Mother. “Let me see whether you can think of any of the seeds for our Easter garden.” “ I know one,” said Sister, after a mo ment. “ ‘Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.’ ” “That’s a fine one,” said Mother. “ Now you bring a seed to plant, Danny.” “ I think I’ll plant ‘Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath ever lasting life,’ ” said Danny. “And I’ll plant Baby’s seed for him,” said Mother. “ ‘Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not; for of such is the kingdom of God.’ ” “What’s the hoe that you use to pull the weeds of doubting, Mother?” asked Danny.
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