{"id":332,"date":"2018-04-24T14:05:04","date_gmt":"2018-04-24T14:05:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/shop.honestreflections.net\/?p=332"},"modified":"2019-12-10T08:44:11","modified_gmt":"2019-12-10T13:44:11","slug":"332","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/2018\/04\/24\/332\/","title":{"rendered":"Pollen!"},"content":{"rendered":"

“I planted, Apollos watered, but God kept everything growing.” 1 Corinthians 3:6<\/strong><\/em>
\nYou know what is annoying?\u00a0 Pollen!
\nI had a great day yesterday, productive.\u00a0 Accomplished a lot.\u00a0 By the time I went to teach a tennis lesson, my last job of the day, I was ready for a relaxing evening.\u00a0 Weather was good, not too hot, not too cold.\u00a0 There was pollen EVERYWHERE.\u00a0 Those long spindly looking things from the trees.\u00a0 It wasn’t until after I’d finished teaching that it really started to affect me.\u00a0 By the time we arrived at our small group my eyes had started to water, I was sneezing and the misery had started.
\nAll because of pollen.\u00a0 Something so tiny had such a large affect on my evening.\u00a0 I went from feeling great to feeling lousy in an hour. But we need the pollen to fertilize the plants. Eventually, they become the trees and flowers we love.\u00a0 They go from ugly little spindly things, or the infamous yellow dusting which covers cars in VA, to a variety of beautiful vegetation in a wonderful array of colors.\u00a0 It is just part of the growing process.
\nYou know what else is annoying?\u00a0 Those little grains of truth we receive at unexpected times which cause us to stop and examine ourselves,\u00a0 our relationship with others and with God.
\nFor instance, yesterday, in the midst of a conversation a trusted friend told me I’m too hard on myself.\u00a0 It was a random comment which I have been thinking about ever since.\u00a0 He’s not wrong, I am too hard on myself.\u00a0 It’s something I’ve struggled with my entire life.\u00a0 I was surprised he had noticed.
\nFor me, it’s a great reminder.\u00a0 One of the fall outs of me being hard on myself is I can be hard on others.\u00a0 I struggle with grace, I tend to fall more on the truth side of life.\u00a0 I’m grateful for the comment, it’s already started to help me not only let myself off the hook, but extend grace to others.
\nIt was the seed I needed to create a larger change.\u00a0 Something which will result in a beautiful outcome somewhere else down the line.\u00a0 God’s word often works for us in the same manner.\u00a0 We’ll read a verse which resonates with us, it strikes a chord.\u00a0 Hopefully, we’ll pause and think about it.\u00a0 We’ll pray about it and ask God what He’s telling us through it.\u00a0 Then as we begin to understand it, we start to apply it to our lives.\u00a0 Hopefully this begins to bring about a change we didn’t even realize we needed.
\nJust as pollen is needed to fertilize the plants, we need the truths of God’s people and His word to fertilize our growth.\u00a0 To spur us on to all God wants and means for us to be.
\nGrowing can be difficult, but it is necessary.\u00a0 It isn’t always an easy process.\u00a0 It can be annoying.\u00a0 It definitely takes time.\u00a0 But the end result is worth it.\u00a0 God can do miracles with a tiny seed!
\nUnfortunately though, we have to endure the pollen to spur on the growth!
\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“I planted, Apollos watered, but God kept everything growing.” 1 Corinthians 3:6 You know what is annoying?\u00a0 Pollen! I had a great day yesterday, productive.\u00a0 Accomplished a lot.\u00a0 By the time I went to teach a tennis lesson, my last job of the day, I was ready for a relaxing evening.\u00a0 Weather was good, not… Continue reading Pollen!<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-332","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","without-featured-image"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=332"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1555,"href":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332\/revisions\/1555"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=332"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=332"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=332"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}