God's Garden - by F.F. Bosworth

A partial copy of an excellent sermon from his book "Christ the Healer"

"I did the planting, Apollos did the watering, bt it was God who made the seed grow ... you are God's field to be planted (1 Cor. 3:6-9 - Moffatt's translation).

How to Get God's Promises Fulfilled

Every moral being on earth has been "bought with a price" to be the Lord's garden in which His "imperishable seed" is to grow and be cultivated and produce its wonders. Real Christians are God's "farm" - His "husbandry" - His "field" - His "garden". A "field" belongs to its owner. So Paul says, "Ye are not your own; ye are bought with a price." God holds the title deed. We are absolutely His. We belong to Him by right of creation and by right of preservation. But the greatest fact is that we belong to Him by right of redemption - because He "bought" us with an infinite price, to be His "field".

The Planting of the Seed

Paul says to the Corinthians, "I did the planting." In the parable of the sower, Jesus said, "The seed is the Word." It is the "imperishable seed." God brings about His wonderful harvests in the same way a farmer does. Jesus said, "e sent forth a sower to sow." It is God's Word that lets us know what to trust Him for. "Faith comes by hearinig" - by our knowing what God's will is for us. Because they can accomplish such wonders, God wants all His "seed" planted. God's purpose in creating seed was that it might be planted in "good ground" where it could germinate and "grow" and "bring forth fruit". So Paul said, "I did the planting." Seed is powerless unless it is planted.

The infinite price God paid for the "field" reveals the importance of planting the "imperishable seed". All of God's wonderful works are potentially in the "seed." David said, "All is work is done in faithfulness," that is, in faithfulness to His promises. God's works are prevented until the seed is in "good ground". His design for us all is that we spend our lives making possible the germination and growth of the "imperishable seed". Nothing can take the place of the seed, not even prayer. Prayer is not the seed; the Word is the seed. The only purpose of God's promises is their fulfillment. They are all a revelation of what He is eager to do for us. The Holy Spirit, whose work it is to fulfill the promises, speaks of them as "exceedingly great and precious," because it removes all reason for doubt and gives us perfect reasons upon which to base our expectations. As "seed," they cannot be changed. They therefore accomplish their wonderful results at any time and in any garden.

It is the business of Christians to prove to the world by actual demonstration that the promises of od are as true today as they were two thousand years ago. They were given to be known and recognized, claimed, and pleaded in prayer. They are to be sown and tilled by prayer. In Romans 4:12, God speaks of Christians as those "who also walk in the steps of that faith of ur father Abraham." meaning that we should all treat every promise God has made to us exactly as Abraham treated God's promise to him. Can it be that God is less real to men of this Holy Spirit dispensation than He was to those who lived in the shadows of these "better things"?

Jesus said to some of the Jews in His day, "My word hath no place in you." What place should te Word of God have in us? I answer that it ought to obtain and retain an inside place in the thoughts, the memory, the conscience, and the affections. It ought to obtain adn retain in us a place of honor, reverence, faith, love and obedience. It ought to obtain and retain in us a place of trust. It ought to obtain and re

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