The Garden of Potential: Live Service
February 1, 2017, 23:00 UTC
By: Leah Starspectre
Welcome to you all, brethren and sisteren and otheren, and thank you for joining me today for my very first live sermon. I so happy to have you all here with me!
It took me a while to find a good topic for a live sermon, but in the end, decided to keep it simple, and took my inspiration from one of my recent apprentice lessons.
One of the passages of the “Art of Peace” (Morihei Ueshiba) that struck me was this:
“Your heart is full of fertile seeds, waiting to sprout. Just as a lotus flower springs from the mire to bloom splendidly, the interaction of the cosmic breath causes the flower of the spirit to bloom and bear fruit in this world.”
The metaphor is a simple, yet powerful one: you are a garden of potential, and the “cosmic breath” of the Force can bring this potential to life.
Let’s face it, Mother Nature makes gardening look easy, doesn't she? A seed falls, and grows. Piece of cake, right?
Who here has ever kept a garden, or even a house plant or pot of herbs?
If you have, you will know that in order for a plant to grow and flourish, certain specific conditions must be met:
A certain amount of sun/shade, frequency of watering, type of soil, distance between seeds, depth of planting. And even then, you’re not guaranteed success.
Not just that, but different plants require different sets of conditions, and take different amounts of time to grow. And will grow in the most cultivated gardens as well as the dankest swamps.
Do you see where I’m going with this yet?
Within your heart are hundreds, thousands, millions of seeds of success, compassion, bravery, wisdom, and love, waiting to open their blooms to the world.
Like plants in a garden, your own achievements and successes require different conditions to ensure they grow and flower.
They will not always happen at once, or at the same times as your friends and peers.
You’ll go through periods of life where you feel like there are great patches of bare earth in your life. You’ll see the beautiful fruits and flowers around you and despair that your own garden is barren.
But there is a quiet power in fields that lie fallow. These are times for rest, and revitalization.
And so, tend the garden of soul as best you are able. You cannot force your potential to become success overnight anymore than you can make a flower blossom before its time simply by willing it.
Revel in the fruits and flowers of your spirit, and do not let the seeming emptiness of your fallow times discourage you. Live in harmony with the Force as it works through you, and through the seeds of your potential.
Thank you.
Now, please join me in reciting the Jedi Creed:
I am a Jedi, an instrument of peace;
Where there is hatred I shall bring love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light;
And where there is sadness, joy.
I am a Jedi.
I shall never seek so much to be consoled as to console;
To be understood as to understand;
To be loved as to love;
For it is in giving that we receive;
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
The Force is with me always, for I am a Jedi.
Thank you all so much for being here with me today. Walk in harmony with the Force.
