This blog is going to be the general musings of a guy well past his prime. It may contain humor from the antics of his seven grown children or his five (soon to be seven) grandchildren or even his senior self. It may contain items related to religion, philosophy, or politics. It may contain non sequitur hints and helps for calculus, software engineering, or how to grill a great meal for family or friends.

Sunday, April 10, 2011

In The Season Thereof

Today, in one of our Sunday classes, we discussed the Word of Wisdom (D&C 89). In passing, the instructor mentioned how verse eleven refers to eating herbs and fruit “in the season thereof” and how, nowadays, this wasn’t such a big thing since we can get herb, fruits, and vegetables all year round. He then went on his “teaching way”.

But the thought of our winter garden came to my mind. In it we have growing romaine lettuce, green onions, and sweet green peas. This is now the second year that we have grown this combination of vegetables in our winter garden in earnest. I thought about how, “in the season thereof”, we can go out to the garden and pick and eat, right then and there, some of those sweet green peas (they are like vegetable candy and especially liked by the grandkids), and how we can pick lettuce and have a fresh and crisp salad, or spice up a meal with very tasty green onions, pulled just before they are used. As they become “ripe” and ready, they provide the best tastes and best flavors. And a little later, in their own time and season, the tomatoes grow and ripen and bring additional enjoyment to our salads.

Then came to mind the verses in Ecclesiastes chapter three: “To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven;”

I realized, yet again, and maybe with a different perspective, that every phase of our life is part of a “time” or a “season”. Often we try to rush into or out of one of these periods, thinking there is something, at that instant of our lives, that would be better served by being in that “other” period of our lives. But to everything there is a season. And, by my experience with the garden, and the counsel of the Word of Wisdom, those things are best used and enjoyed when in season.

The best times and seasons to experience being a full-time missionary are when we are nineteen (or twenty-one) and have the time and strength to serve full-time missions. And that time and season comes again when we are older and have the time and means to once more devote all our efforts full-time in the service of the Lord.

The best time and season to enjoy a young family is after we have served the Lord as a full-time missionary in our youth and have the strength and desire and humility to weld together two separate individuals into a family and to bring children into the eternal home so formed.

There is a time and a season for working in the primary, for working in the Scouts, for teaching, and for presiding. There is a time and a season for getting an education, and one for using that education to provide for the family. There is a time and a season for genealogy and temple work. There is a time and a season for caring for the elderly or the ill.

Each of these experiences, when done in the proper time and season, provide the best freshness, the best taste, the best flavor for that experience, just like eating freshly picked sweet green peas or red ripe tomatoes.

There is no need to hurry from one season to the next. We cannot make our earthly seasons go faster or slower. There is spring, summer, fall, and winter. And in our lives likewise, there is spring, summer, fall, and winter. Nor can we make these seasons of life go faster or slower. And in each of these seasons in our lives, there are smaller times and seasons where we can, and should, take the time to enjoy the fruits of those seasons, right off the vine, in our garden of life.

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