“The Lord God took the man and placed him in the garden of Eden
to work it and watch over it.”
Genesis 2:15
A Surprising Reality
I’m just returning from a two-week trip to Asia. I’m not sure what it says about me that I immediately noticed how overgrown my yard had become. Weeds in my landscaping and garden were rampant.
The day before I left, I had mowed, trimmed, and left everything in great shape. Two weeks later, it looks like an abandoned property. It’s a universal principle that things left unattended migrate toward chaos and disorder. This is true of your garden, and it is true of people.
Our Manhood Mandate
As we consider our manhood mandate, I want to remind us that from the beginning God commanded that we are to CULTIVATE what he has given us. This is our mandate, which we see in Genesis 2:15 - “The Lord God took the man and placed him in the garden of Eden to WORK IT AND WATCH OVER IT.”
A Tough Question
Men, how well are you cultivating those unique responsibilities that God has given you? To cultivate is to nurture, invest, serve. To create an environment for flourishing.
We’ve proposed a few unique responsibilities: our faith, our family, our fitness, our finances, our friends. Our duty toward those responsibilities is to create an environment for flourishing by cultivating – nurturing, investing, and serving. Men – tend your garden.
It's Worth the Investment
Let’s focus on cultivating an environment in our personal lives where we invest in our relationship with God, in our homes where we create an environment for our family to flourish, with our friends where we serve first.
Tending is hard work – but the fruit of our labor is worth the investment.
John Meriweather
MD5 Facilitator
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