Are you wondering about homegrown cucumbers this spring? The National Garden Bureau has declared 2014 the Year of the Cucumber. This tasty plant from the pages of the Bible (Numbers 11:5, Isaiah 1:8) is sure to become a garden favorite as it draws you into rich insight in God’s Word. Last summer was our first try at growing the curbit, a delicious adventure that brought inspiring revelation and a desire to keep company with cucumbers every summer in the garden.
click here for God’s Word for Gardeners Bible book excerpt with devotions on Cultivating & cucumbers
A Garden to Table Story
May this little story plant seed of faith-gardening joys in your daily routine:
Time to set the mail aside and make lunch. A freshly-picked cucumber, just in from the garden, lay rinsed and ready to fill summer sandwiches—a good reprieve from the pressure of payments due. As I sliced the cool, crunchy garden treat, its seeds spilled out and slipped all over the cutting board. By this point, a few weeks into harvesting the vegetable-fruits, our vines had abounded. We ate cucumber salads, cucumber sandwiches, a simple snack of cucumber and Swiss cheese slices, and cucumber slices in ice-cold water, a surprisingly refreshing tip served to me by a friend. Our three vines yielded as many cucumbers as my family cared to eat, and then some, and then some to love our neighbors with!
Before me on the cutting board splashed out enough seeds from ONE slice of ONE of the harvest fruits to fill our garden with plenty of new vines next year. One slice held all the seeds we needed, yet how many slices in how many cucumbers had graced us already this summer, with many yet to come? All of a sudden I was astounded at the abundance—the extravagant testimony of this common garden produce. These simple seeds seemed to squish and surround me with so much, as if whispering God’s words:
…in ALL things
at ALL times
having ALL you need,
you will abound in every good work.
2 Corinthians 9:8 NIV (emphasis added)
This promise of God’s seemed believably logical with the-way-it-is freshness in the context of the cutting board before me. The outpouring seeds from the cucumber’s watery flesh convinced me of God’s intent to abound in every good work I was struggling with. How much I needed to know that!
Keeping Company with Cucumbers
The bills and burdens nearby were no match for the brilliant simplicity of the seeds’ story, and I became certain that I ought to set aside the mail a little more often…much better to keep company with cucumbers!
The harvest of the earth is here!
God, the very God we worship,
keeps us satisfied at his banquet of blessings.
And the blessings keep coming!
Then all the ends of the earth will give him
the honor he deserves and be in awe of him!
Psalm 67:6-7 TPT
Read more devotions on cucumbers in God’s Word for Gardeners Bible from Cultivating in the Garden Work section, beginning on page a-26 or click here to download this Book Excerpt
Garden in Delight is a member of National Garden Bureau, an organization devoted to “educate, inspire, and motivate people to increase the use of plants in homes, gardens, and workplaces.” You can become a member, too! Visit www.ngb.org to learn more
Learn more about planting cucumbers in the Plant Guide: www.gardenindelight.com/plant-guide/cucumber
Photo Credits:
©Shelley S. Cramm & family
NIV denotes Scripture quotations taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.®
TPT denotes Scripture quotations taken from The Passion Translation®. Copyright © 2017, 2018 by Passion & Fire Ministries, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved. ThePassionTranslation.com
You did it, Shelley. You enticed me to plant and nurture cucumbers this year :-)). Thank you for nudging me in the right direction.
Much love,
Judy