15/04/2026
One hot afternoon, I knelt in the dirt, frustrated, holding a straggly pepper plant that looked ready to die no matter how much water I poured on its roots. That’s when it hit me: I was trying to force growth with my own effort, but I forgot the most basic truth of gardening. A seed can’t make itself grow. It can’t produce its own sunlight, or make the rain fall, or create the nutrients it needs to thrive. All it can do is stay rooted in the soil, open to receive what comes from above, and cling to the life that sustains it.
Suddenly, I thought of my faith.
For the longest time, I treated my walk with the Lord the exact same way. I thought growing closer to Him was about how hard I tried: being good, going to church, doing nice things, trying not to make mistakes. “I’m doing my part,” I’d say, and wonder why my faith felt dry, weak, and fruitless. I was trying to stand on my own strength, instead of clinging to the One who gives life.
The Bible says Jesus is the True Vine, and we are the branches. A branch doesn’t bear fruit by trying harder on its own. It only grows when it stays attached, tight and unwavering, to the vine that feeds it. Just like my plants couldn’t survive without sun and rain, I can’t grow in faith without Jesus.
That day, everything changed. I stopped treating my faith like a list of things I had to do right, and started treating it like tending a garden.
My garden grew beautiful after that, not because I suddenly became a perfect gardener, but because I learned to stop relying only on my effort, and trust in the One who gives growth.
That’s the greatest lesson I ever learned: we don’t grow by how strong we are, or how hard we try. We grow by staying rooted, clinging close to Jesus, and letting Him do what only He can do.