Summer Impact from Winter Watering

by DanWolgemuth on July 24, 2015

Most of the Fragment below is an encore post from one that I did in the winter of 2012. It might be an odd time to be running this piece, but I’ve come to realize that what I experience now with my trees is the result of what I did with them in February.

If your soul is dry and parched. If the days feel bleak, lifeless and cold… I pray that these words encourage you.

This morning I read an article by J. E. Klett and C. Wilson from the faculty of Colorado State University.  The topic was: “Winter Watering.”  The opening paragraph of the article reads this way:

Quick Facts…
                   Water trees, shrubs, lawns, and perennials during prolonged dry fall and winter periods to prevent root damage that affects the health of the entire plant.

This was news to me… and at the same time, news to my soul.

In the darkest, coldest, brownest, ugliest, bleakest, and yes, driest times – water.

If I wait… for spring, for life to visibly reappear, for buds and blossoms and smells… I have waited too long.

Water when the pain is deep.

Water when the days are short.

Water when the wind bites.

Water when the soil is cracked.

Water when others don’t.

Water when there is still a chill in the air.

Water in winter.

For the roots.

For what is unseen.

In hope.

In faithfulness.

In commitment.

With trust.

The quality of the shade in summer is a function of the watering done in winter.

O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you;
                   my soul thirsts for you;
          my flesh faints for you,
                   as in a dry and weary land where there is no water.
(Psalm 63:1 ESV)

When the ground is the hardest.  When the winter is the harshest.

Water.

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