trust, dwell, cultivate
reflections on psalm 37:3
Trust in the Lord and do good;
dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness.
Psalm 37:3
This verse in the thirty-seventh chapter of Psalms calls to mind the attitude and posture of a gardener, who cultivates rows of vegetables or neatly-trimmed beds of flowering plants. They “dwell in the land”, so to speak, with their fertilizer and seed catalogues and trowels and loppers. Gardeners know about cultivating.
I myself? Well, I am a cultivator of many things: the messy piles on my desk, the stream of dirty dishes in my sink, the tall stacks of books on my nightstand (and the end table, and the floor…). I cultivate friendships and creativity and gratitude. However, outside of my two small children, I do not cultivate living things well. I am on my fourth fern in two years. It’s an asparagus fern and seemed the least likely to die.
Sometimes I think farmers and gardeners have the advantage when examining verses such as this one…they KNOW about abiding and cultivating because their hearts and bodies are fully involved in such things. But the Psalmist isn’t excluding any of us here, green thumb or not. This whole chapter is ripe with action words that we can grab onto: do not fret, trust in the Lord, delight yourself in the Lord, commit your way, trust, rest in Him, wait for Him, do not fret…
We are invited to practice abiding in many ways. We are invited to cultivate faithful hearts by trusting in the Lord, finding our home in Him.
When we refuse to fret and worry, we find our home in God.
When we make a conscious choice to trust Him, we find our home in God.
When we refuse to esteem our own wisdom, but commit our ways and choices to God, we are making our home in the Lord, cultivating and nurturing a faithful response to the God of the Ages.
We who dwell in the land of business agreements and family crises and longings for more, we who cultivate the busyness of children in school and at the ball fields, we who lay our weary heads down on pillows that probably need to be washed again soon…we are invited to live from a deeper place.
Moses, in the ninetieth Psalm, wrote, “Lord, You have been our dwelling place in all generations”. We make our homes in many ways and places. But our truest home isn’t the house we saved for or the promotion we earned or at home with the children we prayed for. Our truest home is in our Maker.
Trust in the Lord. Do good. Cultivate faithfulness.
Where are you making your home these days?
The Father is inviting you to make your home IN HIM.