Deep and Wide

“‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”   —Luke 10:27

“How do you like living in the city?” was the question many asked me when I moved to Johnstown seven years ago. I like it well enough, but some of the country problems I grew up with are much worse in the city like wild animals in the garden.

 

When we planted our garden this year, we worked late into the evening and didn’t have time to put up our critter fence. Sure enough, two nights later, deer came through and grazed off the tops of four tomato plants. I immediately erected the fence, but with small plants and plenty of open space in the garden, the deer simply jumped over the fence the next night and pulled out two more tomato plants, roots and all. The deer probably just tasted another plant, but rather than it breaking off, the whole plant came up. Again, I immediately took action and replanted both.

 

Watching the tomato plants re-root and re-grow their leaves reminded me of a children’s song many of you probably remember from Sunday School, Deep and Wide. “Deep and wide. There’s a fountain flowing deep and wide.” The song continues, “Hmmm and wide” and the next time “Hmmm and hmmm” repeatedly until the entire lyrics are “Hmmm hmmm hmmm.” The song describes the working of God’s Spirit in our lives and the width and depth of God’s love, but I thought of the similarities between the roots and branches of our garden plants and our Christian lives.

At Oakland, we claim the mission statement, “Making Passionate and Compassionate Followers of Jesus Christ.” We seek to become and to teach others to become followers of Jesus who are deep and wide. Luke 10:27 describes Jesus’ summation of the Law and the Prophets into two commandments, “Love God and Love our Neighbors.” To grow deep is to grow more passionate in our love for God. To grow wide is to grow in demonstrating our love for others.

So how are you doing living out that simple child-like song? Are you growing deeper in the fountain of God’s love? Are you more passionately in love with God today than you were last month or last year? How well are you growing in your compassion for others? Do you demonstrate love, patience, and mercy to those around you? Are you growing in the number of kind deeds you do and prayers you pray for your neighbors? After replanting my tomato plants, I couldn’t tell how the roots were doing, but I could easily see the branches growing greener and leafier. In the same way, you can easily count and measure outreach, but how do you evaluate passion for God?

As you seek to measure your love for God, ask yourself, “Are my worship times sweeter than last year?” “Do I more readily seek to follow God’s ways?” Measuring the growth of a child or a garden plant is quite easy, but measuring the growth of our passion for God may require more serious reflection. I would not suggest that you continually check your spiritual pulse, but a monthly spiritual checkup might prevent some of the chronic spiritual diseases like apathy, hypocrisy, self-righteousness, and criticism. “Deep and wide, deep and wide…” How well does deep and wide describe your love for God and neighbors, today?