“He … removed its stones”
Isaiah 5:2 (NASB)
Stones and fruitfulness don’t mix. If nothing else, stones take up growing space. But more than that, they limit a bed’s ability to retain water, don’t provide nutrition, and actually hinder plants’ ability to get nutrition from soil by making it harder for them to put down roots. Removing stones can be very hard work, especially if they are below the surface, but it has to be done if a garden is to be fruitful. That’s why God does it as part of the garden prep described here.
The same thing is true in our individual lives. We have “stones” in our lives—hardened habits and perceptions—that contribute nothing to our fruitfulness. Indeed, most hinder it by interfering with our ability to draw on what we need to be as fruitful as God wants us to be. And they are hard to get rid of, especially if they are deeply imbedded.
The good news is that God knows that. His Word tells us about those "stones," contains promises that he’ll help us get rid of them, and gives us some good direction on how He’ll do that if we’ll respond. Let’s dig into it and see what it says to us:
