Ashley Clark

“What if even then, God had plans for a second garden? Another tree, and another chance to reach out and accept the abundance of life? What if in Eden, God was planning Gethsemane?"
The question echoed through Lucy, growing in power with each reverberation within her soul.
She held a flower in her hands. The sweet, exotic perfume floated deep into Lucy's heart---carrying Ms. Beth's words right along beside it. Lucy hesitated, allowing the words to take effect. "Are you circling a closed Eden, or have you chosen to step into Gethsemane, through the open gate?"
Lucy blinked. She had never thought of it like that.
"Maybe what you thought was a closed gate meant to punish you is actually God's way of protecting you from remaining in a place where you won't and can't receive His life."
The truth washed Lucy's heart with color. As it brushed over the harsh edges with water, watercolor blooms began to blend one into the other, filling her with understanding.
Lucy's heart swelled as the long-dry soil soaked up this water.
"Where you're preoccupied with your failures and your fears and the desire to preserve all you might lose, God has a plan to preserve something else. To root you in a place where life can grow within you once more, freely and abundantly. A garden of death for a garden of life, where through His own resurrection Jesus returns all that was stolen.”
― Ashley Clark, Paint and Nectar