wonky parsnips

Wonky and funny-looking, this parsnip we harvested in our garden this week certainly has that rustic look. Mr Tesco certainly wouldn’t sell it. It is far from perfect in size, shape or colour. But it is very, very good. And yes, tasted very lovely in my Sunday lunch, thank you for asking.

In our machine-pressed production-line identikit world the humble wonky parsnip can be… refreshing. An example of something not perfect – at least, in the machine-pressed production-line identikit sense – but definitely very, very good.

God doesn’t expect us to be perfect – at least, not in the machine-pressed production-line identikit supermarket-parsnip sense – but he does create us as good. Creation itself was described as good; not perfect. Maybe we can find that liberating. We are created to be individual, to be unique, to be different and yes to be good… but not to be perfect.

So struggle no longer to be perfect. Stop comparing yourself with other people and always coming out second best because everyone else is perfect and you are not. None of us are, none of us are meant to be, and try as we might none of us will be.

So let’s celebrate being wonky; and our churches being a veritable market garden of wonky, muddy, beautifully unique and surprisingly good parsnips.

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January 30, 2011

[…] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Tina Wheelhouse, Kevin Lewis. Kevin Lewis said: A celebration of wonky parsnips and something deeper. http://fb.me/EAFORB3p […]

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m_eth_odist

January 31, 2011

http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/main/w-chl/w-countryside_environment/w-food_farming/w-food-we-love-knobbly-veg.htm

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c2drl

January 31, 2011

When you start to grow your own fruit and vegetables you realise so much about Gods creation. As you say the size and shape is not uniform and the small ones and the mis-shapen ones are just as useful. Also the taste is so different from Mr Tesco’s bland and controlled offering. I wonder if the trend to using so many spices in today’s cooking is thanks to the removal of taste by supermarkets from food. And they are so much better for you. Mr Tesco treats his with things to make them last and look ‘attractive’. From the garden they are fresh and ready to eat.

So it is with all of God’s creation. We are made to be, not to do and so we come in all shapes and sizes. We are good, we don’t need preservatives and polish we are fresh and ready to serve our purpose. And we don’t need spicing up. God made us right frirst time and we jsut need to be protected from a few pests and dieeases to be so muich better than the world can produce for all its scientific approach which tries to take away our individuality and spirit.

Raise a cheer for mis-shapen Parsnips, Potatos and People.

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c2drl

January 31, 2011

Since submitting my last comment two things have happened.

1. I heard a not unusual sad story that in a local Church the leaders are getting ideas above their station and are going around hurting some lovely people telling them that their contribution is not wanted and they don’t fit!

2. I took advantage of a burst of winter sun to finish a job I started before the early snow, spreading horse manure on the vegetable garden so that it can sink in ready for the spring sowing.

I got to thinking that so often it is out of the dirt and unattractive stuff that comes something good. In this case wonderful mis-shapen parsnips etc, I hope. I can’t understand why God chooses to let these things happen but I know he shares the pain I feel for these people, who were already mis-shapen parsnips with a great sensitivity from earlier life events. I have confidence that he will produce wonderful fruit (sorry vegetables!) from thse events and that the knarls and notches will add to their rugged beauty. But I just wish it didn’t have to be like this.

Lets raise an even bigger cheer for mis-shapen parsnips, they need it.

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faith rowbury

January 31, 2011

Lets all celebrate our Uniqueness – how we are each so different; yet we all can strive for the same;to celebrate Jesus by living through his spirit,worshipping him,loving him, repenting of our sins and being forgiven.

Not one of us here on Earth is perfect, we are far from it – let us not forget that as we are each tested by others, let us be able to forgive others and forgive ourselves for mistakes made.

Jesus leads us by his perfect examples, we can follow and trust in him. We can each bring our strengths to Jesus may it be, intelligence,loving;compassion or quirkiness; but, we also can bring our weaknesses, because Jesus already knows us,exactly what we are and what we are like, our whole being. It is those things that make us Human and through our Lord Jesus Christ we can learn to work through things that we may not like so much about ourselves;we can love ourselves and each other;we can show kindness;compassion and forgiveness.

But we still won’t be perfect, far from it………. so love yourself and others;learn from yours and others mistakes, and keep loving our Lord Jesus Christ x x x x x x

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Rev Si

February 1, 2011

Before you guys get all dewy eyed and mysterious about mis-shapen parsnips, its because the soil was not ideal. Too rich a soil with too much manure produces forked parsnips, perhaps over fertilising Christians has a similar effect?

Next time grow parsnips in soil that had compost, fertiliser manure etc applied in the previous season.

Reply
1. Kevin
  
  February 1, 2011
  
  An easy mistake for an over-enthusiastic (church) planter to make in the first season! There was no manure tho, only healthy compost! As for over-fertilising Christians, that sounds like the recipe for a good blog subject…!
  
  Reply
Di Adem

February 1, 2011

Over fertilising christians sounds like good news for the catholics. Presumably we will then get more of them. I am sure we evangelicals will come up with a more straight laced way of dealing with the issue.

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Edge

February 1, 2011

I grow vegetables. Mine come in all shapes and (usually smallish) sizes. I feed and weed and water and plead with them and eventually, occasionally, I get to harvest something hoping it might be ripe and ready. I dig it up, clean it up and present it proudly to the missus. Like the parsnips I gave her last weekend.
That is when she usually tells me that she has been stockpiling the things from Sainsbury’s. And so my mis-shapen offering tends to end up in the compost bin.
Which sounds harsh, but then again, it depends how you look at it. Because I don’t really like vegetables. I prefer weetabix myself.
Christians are sometimes a bit like breakfast cereal too though, aren’t they? Snap, crackle and pop…

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James Harvey

February 2, 2011

just brilliant!!! Thank you!!! The sentence that ‘God created the world and it was good – not perfect’ , was just amazing and a breath of fresh air. Ruth

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