This afternoon I gave the lawn it's first cut of 2025.  It always amazes me how bulky the grass is that gets cut from a relatively small space... I had to empty the grass box three times, and by the end of it, my 'garden waste' bin was more than half full.  I also cut back the hydrangeas (someone told me this was a spring task and as long as I cut above the buds/shoots all will be ... time will tell).  The parsley and tarragon in the pots are springing up and it won't be long before the self-set mint is once more reaching skywards.

I'm not a gardener, but I do enjoy the metaphors that gardening (or at least agriculture and viniculture) offer for thinking about spirituality and church life... spring is that odd mixture of new life, with buds and blossom, and stripping back what has died off over the winter.  I find myself pondering what metaphorical spring 'gardening' tasks are being undertaken by God's Spirit in my life, and the lives of the communities I serve.