Out of everything that I have grown this year – thus being my very first time – Bell Peppers have taken the longest to bud, bloom and bear fruit. The buds arrived but seemed to lie dormant over a considerable length of time, while the plant itself increased in stature; throughout what appeared to be a very pointless and unsuccessful process, the stems continued to grow in diameter and strength, despite weeks and weeks of patience, repetitious tending – watering, positioning them for ample sun light, shade during soaring withering temperatures, along with shielding them from sudden violent storms and winds (the benefits of container gardening). It almost came to the point of giving up hope for them in this endless cycle.

The blooms arrived just only a few weeks ago, to my surprise, while simultaneously becoming concerned with autumn fast approaching; will I have enough time to squeeze out just one green pepper before frost sets in?

To my joy, these blooms took hardly any amount of time before I started to hear the ‘chimes’ of green bells! Just within the last week, there are already seven growing strong at an incredible rate. Each day reveals a significant difference in their size. As a matter of fact, these enthusiastic green ‘ringers’ are by far more impressive in their rapid growth rate than my Jalapeño’s and Roma tomatoes. More are blooming as the green family continues to multiply, so it looks like I’ll be cooking a variety of Bell Pepper dishes coming Fall Season.

It all made sense to me that before these buds bloomed the stems had to thicken and strengthen in order to bear the size and weight of fruit, which in turn had me pondering over how God prepares our life, maturing us so we can be entrusted to bear the kind of fruit that brings honour and glory to His name and joy to His heart.

Amazingly, Jesus did not begin his earthly ministry until He was thirty years of age (amazing because He was God veiled in flesh in comparison to just ordinary men and women). We have very little recorded of the Messiah’s childhood years. Yet, there is so much in the minute fragments that reveal so much if we but take time to think: “Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature and in favour with God and man” (Luke 2:52). All those years of silent preparation that resulted in holding the world with utter amazement when He opened His mouth and spoke the Word. Nothing had ever impacted human history so much as Christ’s first Advent.

So many of us grow impatient with our own lives; we want three years of preparation and thirty years of the spectacular. God invests the real work in the foundation of our lives – things that we don’t always see and what takes a little longer than we normally expect – so that when we do bear fruit it will be the kind that lasts and pleases Him.