Linebackers and Ballerinas:The Freedom of Becoming What You Were Created to Be

Thursday evening, I was watering the garden when I noticed something that made my heart leap.

A flower.

One tiny bloom on my Fairytrail Bride hydrangea.

For weeks, I had been watching that plant, wondering if it was doing anything at all. Had it survived winter in the pot? Was it happy being out of the pot in its sunny new location? Was it getting enough sun? Too much sun? Should I move it again?

Every gardener knows the temptation to stare at a plant and wonder if anything is happening.

Then, while watering, I saw a bloom.

And standing there with a hose in my hand, I realized something. The flower didn’t bloom that evening. That evening was simply the first time I saw it.

The roots had been growing long before the flower appeared. The framework had been developing long before there was evidence. The plant was becoming what it was planted to be even when I couldn’t see it.

A few days earlier, I had stumbled across old photographs from April of 2015. I wasn’t looking for anything profound. I was trying to remember where I had planted something years ago. Instead, I found a testimony.

There it was.

A rough shovel line scratched through the grass. Freshly turned dirt. Tiny plants scattered across bare soil. No patio. No mature trees. No hostas spilling over retaining walls. No rose bushes. No sanctuary.

Just dirt. And sod. And hope. And a woman willing to begin.

At the time, I was renting this little white house after losing nearly everything in a house fire. My daughters and I were rebuilding. Life felt uncertain. My finances felt uncertain. My future felt uncertain.

I used to joke that I lived in a teeny tiny house on a teeny tiny yard with a teeny tiny dog and a teeny tiny bank account.

Looking back, I realize there was more truth in that statement than humor.

I rented this house from 2013 to 2016 before eventually purchasing it. Somewhere during those years, something unexpected happened. What began as a temporary place slowly started feeling like home.

Not because the house changed but because God was changing me.

I still remember the walk-through with the landlord.

The house felt impossibly small. The kitchen was painted a bright McDonald's yellow, paired with aging oak cabinets. The living room wore a shade of green-gray that I still can't quite describe—a color I have never seen anywhere in nature before or since. There was only one bathroom for four girls, and all I could see were the things that needed fixing.

But my oldest daughter, Abigayle, could see something I couldn't. With wisdom far beyond her years, she quietly looked around and said, “Mom, I know you. You'll paint, you'll design, and you'll make it home. This is the one.”

She was right.

What I saw was a house. What she saw was possibility.

And somewhere between the paintbrushes, the hand-me-down furniture, the laughter, the tears, the celebrations, and the ordinary Tuesday nights, that little house became the backdrop for some of the most precious years of our lives.

At the time, I thought she was talking about a house. Now I know she was talking about something much deeper.

Looking at those photographs, I realized something I had never fully appreciated before.

The woman standing in that yard about to rip out sod had no idea what God was about to do.

She couldn’t see the future.

She couldn’t see the grandchildren.

She couldn’t see the ministry.

She couldn’t see the women God would one day place in her care.

She couldn’t see Bible studies around tables, conversations over coffee, or the quiet privilege of opening God’s Word with others.

She couldn’t see Field & Feather.

She couldn’t see directing Small Groups.

She couldn’t see the opportunities that would come through Staples, the promotions, the leadership responsibilities, or the provision God would bring.

She couldn’t see the countless mornings she would spend on that patio with an open Bible, watching the sun rise over a garden that didn’t exist yet.

She couldn’t see any of it.

She was simply trying to be faithful with what was in front of her.

A rented house.

A small yard.

A shovel.

A dream.

Looking back now, I wish I could put my arm around her and tell her what God already knew.

I would tell her that the losses would not define her.

I would tell her that God was not finished.

I would tell her that one day she would walk through a flourishing garden and be overwhelmed by gratitude.

I would tell her that the house she worried wasn’t enough would become one of the greatest gifts of her life.

I would tell her that God was doing far more than providing a place to live.

He was creating a sanctuary.

Not just a sanctuary filled with flowers and trees, but a sanctuary where He would meet her again and again. A sanctuary where tears would be shed, prayers would be whispered, Scripture would be read, and faith would deepen. A sanctuary where grandchildren would be loved. A sanctuary where ministry would take root. A sanctuary where a woman would slowly discover that God’s plans had always been kinder than her fears.

The woman in those photographs spent years wondering if God would provide enough.

The woman writing these words is overwhelmed by how much He did.

That realization is what brought tears to my eyes.

Not the garden itself.

Not the hostas.

Not the hydrangeas.

Not even the old photographs.

It was the realization that while I was busy worrying about what was missing, God was quietly building something beautiful. And He was doing it one season at a time.

When I walk through the garden today, every corner tells a story. There is a rose bush for each of my grandchildren. There are terra-cotta pots that belonged to my mother. There are trees planted during seasons of hope and flowers planted during seasons of grief. There are prayers woven into the soil and memories attached to nearly every bed.

The garden became while I became. And perhaps that is why I love it so much. Because when I walk through it, I am not simply looking at plants. I am looking at thirteen years of God’s faithfulness.

Over the years, God has taught me that He rarely measures things the way I do.

I look at size. He looks at faithfulness.

I look at visibility. He looks at fruit.

I look at what something has become. He looks at what it is becoming.

Maybe that's why one of my favorite lessons came from two hostas.

My daughter Matalyn has a hosta called Blue Mammoth. The name fits perfectly. It becomes enormous. It stops being a perennial and starts becoming a landscape feature. You don't admire it so much as navigate around it. It's the hosta equivalent of a linebacker.

Meanwhile, tucked beneath larger plants in my own garden is a tiny hosta called Mighty Mouse. If Blue Mammoth is the linebacker of the hosta world, Mighty Mouse is the ballerina—small, graceful, and easy to overlook if you're moving too quickly.

And yet I never walk past it without noticing it.

Its beauty isn't found in its size. It's found in its uniqueness. It doesn't compete with the Blue Mammoth. It doesn't try to become something larger. It simply unfolds into exactly what God designed it to be.

Standing in the garden one morning, I realized how much of life is spent comparing Mighty Mouse to Blue Mammoth.

We compare ministries.

We compare influence.

We compare platforms.

We compare opportunities.

We compare houses, careers, marriages, accomplishments, and seasons.

We assume bigger must mean better.

But God never asked Mighty Mouse to become Blue Mammoth.

The kingdom has room for linebackers and ballerinas.

Some lives become blue mammoth landmarks that can be seen from a distance. Others become quiet, mighty mouse beauties discovered by those who slow down long enough to notice. Neither is lesser. Both reveal the creativity of their Creator.

That realization changed the way I looked at my own life.

For years I thought fulfillment lived somewhere beyond the horizon. A bigger house. A larger yard. More money. More influence. More security. Different circumstances. Marriage.

Yet here I was standing in a tiny backyard that had become holy ground.

A place where daughters grew up.

A place where grandchildren now play.

A place where prayers were prayed.

A place where God repeatedly proved His faithfulness.

The tiny house had become home.

The tiny yard had become a sanctuary.

And the tiny things I once overlooked had become some of my greatest treasures.

That is true in gardens.

It is also true in the kingdom of God.

God seems remarkably comfortable with slow growth. Perhaps because He understands something we often forget: roots determine what a life can carry.

Perhaps that is why Scripture so often speaks in the language of planting, abiding, and fruitfulness. God is rarely in a hurry, because He is always working toward something deeper than appearances.

The Fairytrail Bride bloom reminded me of that.

This week, I was preparing a new bed beneath my new Temple of Bloom tree. Three hydrangeas. Six blue sedges. I moved pots around more times than I care to admit. Too close. Too far apart. Not enough room. Too much room.

Then the sky darkened.

Thunder rolled overhead.

Lightning alerts appeared on my phone.

The radar lit up red and yellow.

And I had to go inside.

Suddenly, the garden was no longer mine to manage.

The rain was coming whether I approved of the layout or not.

Standing by the window, watching the storm roll in, I thought about a bike ride from the day before. The wind had been relentless. Rosa fell. Liz wasn’t feeling well. Then I fell too. My back hurt. The miles felt harder than they should have.

Nothing about that ride was easy. Yet we kept moving.

Sometimes faith looks less like triumph and more like turning the pedals into a headwind you didn’t choose.

The storm outside my window and the bike ride felt strangely connected.

There comes a point when you’ve done what you can do.

You’ve planted.

You’ve prepared.

You’ve pedaled.

You’ve prayed.

And then you have to trust God to be God.

Paul understood this when he wrote,

“I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase” (1 Corinthians 3:6).

What a freeing truth. I can plant. I can water. I can work. I can obey.

But I cannot make a single thing grow. Only God can do that.

The same God who grew a garden from a patch of grass grew a life from the ashes of loss. The same God who provided a home provided purpose. The same God who brought flowers from bare soil brought beauty from places I once thought were broken beyond repair.

Psalm 92 says,

“Those who are planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of our God” (Psalm 92:13)

Notice what the psalm does not say.

It does not say the most talented will flourish.

It does not say the most visible will flourish.

It does not say the biggest, fastest, strongest, or most impressive will flourish.

It says those who are planted.

Before there is fruit, there are roots.

Before there is flourishing, there is abiding.

Before there is becoming, there is surrender.

Perhaps that is why Jesus said,

“Abide in Me, and I in you” (John 15:4)

The secret of growth is not striving.

It is abiding.

As I stood in the garden this week, admiring a tiny bloom on my Fairytrail Bride and a storm rolling across the sky, I realized something beautiful.

The bloom was visible. The growth happened long before. And perhaps that is true of your life too.

Maybe you are in a season where all you can see is dirt.

Maybe you are staring at promises that seem slow to unfold.

Maybe you are wondering whether God is doing anything at all.

Take heart.

Roots are still growth.

Hidden work is still work.

The absence of visible fruit is not the absence of God’s activity.

The Gardener has not forgotten what He planted.

Today, when I walk through this little yard, I see flowers and trees and hostas. But I also see evidence.

Evidence that God is faithful over long stretches of time.

Evidence that He finishes what He starts.

Evidence that growth often happens while we are busy wondering if anything is happening at all.

I thought I was building flower beds.

I thought I was creating a garden.

I thought I was making a home.

All along, God was doing something much deeper.

He was cultivating a woman while she thought she was cultivating a garden.

And looking back now, I can finally see the beauty of His work.

Prayer

Father, thank You for being faithful in every season of our lives. Thank You for the work You do beneath the surface, long before we see the evidence of it. Forgive us for the times we grow impatient, forget Your goodness, or try to carry responsibilities that belong to You alone.

Help us to trust You in the waiting. Teach us to remain planted, rooted, and abiding in Christ. Give us eyes to recognize Your hand in both the joyful seasons and the difficult ones. When we are tempted to measure growth by what we can see, remind us that You are always at work, even in the hidden places.

Thank You for every way You have provided, guided, protected, and grown us. Thank You that You finish what You start. May our lives bear fruit that points others to Your faithfulness and Your glory.

In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Scripture

“Those who are planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of our God. They shall still bear fruit in old age; they shall be fresh and flourishing.” — Psalm 92:13–14 (NKJV)

Core Thought

Growth often happens long before it becomes visible. While we focus on blooms, God is developing roots. While we worry about outcomes, He is shaping character. The Gardener has not forgotten what He planted.

Reflection Questions

1. Looking back over your life, where can you now see God’s faithfulness in seasons that once felt uncertain?

2. What “small beginnings” has God used to grow something beautiful in your life?

3. Are there areas where you are trying to produce growth instead of trusting God with the increase?

4. What promises, prayers, or dreams feel unfinished today, and how does the image of roots growing beneath the surface encourage you?

5. If you could speak to a younger version of yourself, what would you tell her about God’s faithfulness?