Planting a garden requires that the gardener prepare
the soil, clearing it of vegetation that would hinder the
growth of the crop to be planted and grown. For the crop’s
ongoing protection, the gardener must constantly guard
against weeds that grow up and seek to rob the plants of the
nutrients needed for their maturity.
Weeds that destroy life and plants that nourish life grow
in the same plot of land if the owner of the garden does not
diligently tend to the garden.
During a 60 Minutes interview with Holocaust survivor
Yehiel Dinur, who testified at the 1960 trial of Adolf Eichmann,
Mike Wallace asked Dinur why he cried and then
collapsed to the floor at the trial. Dinur explained that his
reaction was not what he had anticipated. Although Eichmann
personified evil, the encounter made Dinur realize
that sin and evil are the natural human condition.
“I was afraid about myself,” Dinur concluded. “I saw
that I am capable to do this . . . I am . . . exactly like he.”
Dinur’s words spoken fifty-six years ago still ring true
today. If we do not tend our lives, we can allow evil to grow
where we intended holiness. Evil, like weeds, actively seeks
a place to dwell and flourish. When we stop tending our
lives we become welcome homes for evil. We often think
of people like Eichmann and others as “evil.” However, our
foibles are more than little missteps without consequences;
they build patterns of destructive behavior. A few weeds
can take over an untended plot of land. Jesus warns us to
fill our lives with words, actions, events, and people that
sanctify our lives.

By James Swanson Sr. from The Upper Room: 60 Days of Prayer for General Conference 2016