I planted vineyards. I made gardens and parks and planted all kinds of fruit trees in them. I made reservoirs to water groves of flourishing trees . . .” (Ecclesiastes 2:4-5).
How does your garden grow? Easily, if your name is King Solomon.
We’ve all heard the expression, “gentleman farmer.” I have an idea Solomon was a “gentleman gardener,” and when he wrote, “I planted” and “I made,” what he really meant was he had his servants do it. Do you suppose he ever got blisters on his hands and dirt under his fingernails, or had sore muscles from gardening? I somehow doubt it.
Early in the book of Genesis, the Bible associates thorns, thistles and sweat with gardening, and I suspect that when the discomfort is absent, the satisfaction level lessens also. Solomon may have missed that connection, and thus missed the therapeutic value of working the soil.
There’s a basic satisfaction that comes from controlling the crab grass and dandelions that threaten to take over the world. Having a clean, tidy garden somehow makes you feel you’re taking good care of God’s earth. Whether it’s knowing you have eliminated the mildew from the rose bushes, or kept the worms off the tomato plants, there’s a healing satisfaction in knowing you have worked hand in hand with nature’s God to produce something good.
If Solomon had spent more time pruning his grape vines and less time chasing girls, he would have been a better man, he would have been a better king, and possibly he would not have accepted the false gods brought in by some of his women.
Solomon wrote about the sweet sleep that comes to a laboring
man, which the wealthy man misses entirely. As wise as he is reputed to have
been, you’d think he would have caught on, done some real physical labor, and
enjoyed a happier life. If he’d spent more time with a hoe and rake, the
history of ancient