This week, my husband and I were sitting out in our backyard for dinner and, as usual, I was checking on all my plants out there. I have come to love doing this because this backyard (and outdoor space, in general) at this new house has been such a gift. It’s normally just a quick check to see if any of the perennials need any deadheading or watering, or to see if any stubborn little weeds have poked their head up through the mulch. But as I was taking in my clematis, I noticed something I had clearly missed in the last couple of evenings.
Look at the leaves on the top half. They’re pointed, sometimes with three points. But notice the more roundish ones creeping up from on the bottom of the clematis?
Well, when I spotted these strange leaves, I jumped up out of my chair and started gently pulling back the true clematis leaves to see what and where this stuff was coming from. …It was a rampant case of bindweed.
What is bindweed, you ask? “Bindweed is a vine that spreads by both seeds and an extensive underground system of roots. Some of those roots can reach up to 20 feet deep or more, and bindweed seeds can actually remain in the soil, ready to sprout, for as long as 60 years” (RoundUp). In other words, it’s a viral invasive weed that is almost impossible to kill. It also loves to use other plants as infrastructure.
I’ve been voraciously pulling out whatever I can see when I water the perennials in my side and front beds, 
but for some reason, I had totally forgotten to keep checking on my clematis, the plant I’m most exited about having in my garden. 🤦🏻♀️
So, as I looked, I realized that the bindweed had really started to take hold. It took two sets of hands to get it all out, and it left her looking a little sparse!
Maybe you’re asking why I’m telling you all this. No, I haven’t gone and turned this into a gardening blog.
I’m telling you this because it occurred to me, after reading through John 13-16 yesterday in my Bible reading plan, this incident was a good object lesson: Even if you’re aware and guarded about a particular kind of weed in the garden of your heart, if you’re not careful to survey the whole of your heart garden, weeds can creep up where you didn’t expect.
One particular area of our garden we Christians have neglected to tend has been our relationship with the world.
This is what John 15:18-24 says:
“If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours. But all these things they will do to you on account of my name, because they do not know him who sent me. If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have been guilty of sin, but now they have no excuse for their sin. Whoever hates me hates my Father also. If I had not done among them the works that no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin, but now they have seen and hated both me and my Father. But the word that is written in their Law must be fulfilled: ‘They hated me without a cause.’
In the past, Christians have been taught consistently that friendship with the world is enmity with God. There is no real way to follow after Jesus in a way that the world will like; they are just two opposing worldviews. And I think that any serious Christian does get this and seeks out some level of personal holiness to honour God. But I wonder if we haven’t been as aggressive or as guarded as we ought to be about it in our ecclesiology, our theology of the Bride of Christ, the Church–Jesus’ treasured clematis, so to speak. The Church has become bound up in the bindweed of our time and cares more about how the world views us than what the Word actually says.
In some ways, it’s not surprising. Just like the bindweed in my clematis, we should not be surprised that if we don’t carefully attend to reading and studying our Bibles, and consistently and aggressively weeding out even the tiniest of sins, a kind of bindweed will rise up and choke our churches. In fact, like how the bindweed will eventually choke out the clematis if left to its own devices, our careless and casual approach to the authority of scripture is starting to choke the Church herself; we no longer seem truly grieved or even slightly bothered that the average Christian doesn’t read their Bible regularly, doesn’t attend church regularly, or have any problems with the secular worldview creeping into the church community and pulpit. In fact, anyone who stills holds to the Bible’s teaching on, say, women pastors, gender roles, sexual ethics, or the physical gathering of the body has become the brunt of much scorn and anger from within the church!
Interestingly, after warning his disciples about what friendship with the world cost, Jesus goes on to say,
“But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me. And you also will bear witness, because you have been with me from the beginning.
“I have said all these things to you to keep you from falling away. They will put you out of the synagogues. Indeed, the hour is coming when whoever kills you will think he is offering service to God. And they will do these things because they have not known the Father, nor me. But I have said these things to you, that when their hour comes you may remember that I told them to you. (John 15:26-16:4)
Note first that, after giving His warning, Jesus tells us Help is coming! We don’t have to resist the world on our strength! Second, note that Jesus warns them that conflict will come from the synagogues, and that the conflict will be motivated by a desire to honour God!
My dear friend, if you have felt as weary as I have this week with the Pride posts, the ongoing overreach of our government, and the apathy of your fellow believers on the dangers of being isolated from the rest of the body, this is good news for your weary soul!
Jesus is the true vine, and if we stay connected to Him we will bear fruit. This will be a hard season for those of us fighting to keep our heart gardens free from the love of the world. It will cost us. But we have a Helper who will lead us into all truth (John 16:13), and He is the guarantee of the glories to come (2 Corinthians 1:22). And, as my dad reminded me, that sixty years of bindweed’s life is similar to the sixty years or so of our fight against sin, but one day our fight will come to an end and our battle with this particular sin will come to end, and all the bindweed and sin will be destroyed! (Read further about that here)
Take time today to take a survey of your own heart. Are there areas you have neglected? Is their arrogance, hardness, or bitterness that has taken root? Have you been to casual with your approach to the Scriptures? Confess it. He is faithful and just to forgive you; it’s His delight to! (1 John 1:9; Isaiah 55:6-9)
And though it feels like the Master Gardener is doing pruning that is leaving us feel more than a little “sparse” right now, this is the path to fruitful growth. Just like my clematis, who today, has filled in and is looking fine, we just have to trust Him. We have to trust that His Word is true enough that we obey even when it hurts or is confusing or causes us to be misunderstood.
Friendship with the world is bindweed; true heart obedience is freedom and life.
What you’ll find here is a collection of musings, thoughts, writings, and ramblings about things I’m reading, watching, and thinking about. It’s my goal to inspire, encourage, and instruct my fellow sisters in their walk with Jesus and their understanding of the Word.
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