BUMPER Crop

Wow...even the bush farm in Lagiloa did not produce a bumper crop like this one!

Summer squash...the waiting is over! Mom has been sauteeing upo with shrimp, or chicken, or pork...with lots of garlic.

Norma's favorite -- chilis -- but so far, lacking fire...

This season's upo out-produced last summer's crop...

Here and there...blushing tomatoes signal ripeness.

It took me a very long time -- and many, many life lessons -- to finally understand Galatians 6:7, A man reaps what he sows. "What goes around comes around," someone in Italy once told me. "For every action, there's an equal re-action" is one of the laws of physics.

So when we planted tomato seeds, of course we expected to harvest tomatoes. It just took me a (long!) while to transfer this practical knowledge into the spiritual realm on an experiential level. The one who sows to please his sinful nature, from that nature will reap destruction; the one who sows to please the SPIRIT, from the SPIRIT will reap eternal life. (Galatians 6:8, NIV)

SPRING Not Yet Sprung

Backyard neighbor's lemons...ours for the picking. Was it Charlie Brown who was always given lemons in his cartoon life? Yet somehow, he made lemonade from the many lemons that feisty Lucy always threw at him.

Uncle Ric's sayote...also called sechium edule (its scientific name), merliton, tayota, choko, chocho, chow-chow, christophene, alligator pear, chayote, vegetable pear. This two-month old plant has yet to mature, but it will begin to bear fruit around April-May, and continue to bear much fruit in the summer months ahead. This is a typical Filipino vegetable, usually cooked in a soup with meat; but i've also grown it in Lagiloa, our bush farm in Taveuni, Fiji.

Mom and Uncle's vegetable patch in hiatus, already cultivated with manure. Today, the stormy weather is bringing much rain which will mix the dirt and manure, readying the soil for the seeds to be sown soon.

Do not be deceived, GOD is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. For he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the SPIRIT will of the SPIRIT reap everlasting life. (Galatians 6:7-8)

i see GOD's Word illustrated in His creation. When Mom sows the ampalaya (momordica charantia linn or bitter melon) seeds, she will harvest the fruit of the ampalaya...for whatever she sows, that she will also reap.