Picking Berries, Seeking God

Kimberly Andrich reflects on how picking raspberries with her children helped her to understand the importance of pursuing God.

“Look, Mom!” my young daughter exclaimed as she and her sister ran from the back of our yard toward the house, carrying the small plastic containers I had given them before sending them out to pick raspberries. A single layer of plump berries nearly covered the bottom of each.

As a mother often does, I told them they did a great job and that their berries looked wonderful, then headed to the back myself.

On my first trip around the plants, I easily gathered several times as many berries as the girls had, filling half my own, larger container.

I could have been satisfied with what I had found there, but I knew I was not done yet.

The next is the part I most enjoy: the challenge of finding the hidden berries. I love finding and picking the ones I need to crouch down to see, that I can only find by looking from various directions and angles, moving leaves aside and reaching between branches to pick.

It's amazing what abundance of berries I find when I put in the effort to look for them. I nearly doubled the number of berries I had picked previously. My container was almost full.

On this particular day, it struck me how picking berries mirrors the spiritual life.

null

Seeking God

Many people approach the spiritual life as my young kids approached the raspberry bushes, picking the berries that catch their attention and the ones they can reach with little effort then running happily away, satisfied enough with what they had found. Others leave the berry bush, unsatisfied but unwilling to look further, assuming there is little for them to find.

Those who approach God this way put little effort into the spiritual life. For various reasons, they allow themselves to be easily distracted and avoiding a real commitment to the sacraments and to prayer. They may go to Mass, but they do so from a place of obligation rather than self-gift. The fruit they receive from God will typically be quite little as they do not give Him the space or time to produce abundance in their lives.

Another group will look a bit harder at the plants, spending some time finding as many raspberries as they can see. They will look at both the top and bottom of the bushes and reach over them as needed to get the ones on the other side of the plant.

These are the people who go to Mass and who spend some time with God in prayer each day but don’t fully give themselves to Him or to receiving the full abundance of what He has to offer them. They pursue God, but generally their pursuit continues to feel obligatory.

But then there are others who will dig deeper, looking intensely, trying to gather as many raspberries as they can find, seeking the hidden berries and reaching past the thorns, while risking being poked and scratched, to gather them.

Those are people who are hungry for God, who love Him enough to give themselves, their time, and their hearts to pursuing Him. Who desire to receive from Him anything and everything He wants to give them and who, even more, are hungry to receive God Himself. They pursue Him and allow Him to pursue them, not from a place of obligation but from a place of loving Him and receiving His love for them. For such people, the spiritual harvest is abundant.

null

God Reveals Himself to Us

God grows and provides the raspberries of our lives. All good things come from Him, and He desires to give generously to us. We cannot produce these “raspberries,” nor will we find them except where He has made them grow. But we will often miss them if we are not open and looking, if our eyes are not on Him and our hearts and souls not seeking Him.

The Lord tells us through the prophet Jeremiah,

“When you look for me, you will find me. Yes, when you seek me with all your heart, I will let you find me.” (Jeremiah 29:13-14a)

God desires that we find Him. But He will only reveal Himself in proportion to our willingness and ability to seek and receive. If we seek Him with our whole hearts, He will show Himself to us in abundance. We will begin to find Him in more places than we would have ever thought.

St. John of the Cross says, “God gives in the measure that we expect of Him” (quoted by Father Jacques Philippe in Searching for and Maintaining Peace, p. 28).

If we expect to find our Lord, we look for Him. If we have hope that He will lift us up, we are more likely to give ourselves to Him. And when we seek Him and give ourselves to Him, He gives generously to us. When we have faith that we will receive and come to Him with a large container, He fills it.

Share your thoughts with the Catholic Mom community! You'll find the comment box below the author's bio and list of recommended articles.

null