Oh My Gourd!

Last fall I bought several pumpkins and gourds to decorate my house for the Halloween season. After the holiday I was tossing them into the pile behind my garage where I put leaves, sticks, weeds, and other yard waste—but my wife convinced me to put one of the pumpkins into a spot in the yard where the seeds might sprout. Slowly but surely, a squash plant did begin to grow: all summer we have carefully mowed around it, and have watered it during hot and dry weather. The plant has survived, although the leaves are somewhat pale; now it has several blossoms and one small fruit is beginning to form. It’s about the size of a plum, and we hope it will grow into a pumpkin.

Meanwhile, a few weeks ago we noticed something behind the garage. On this pile of yard waste, a plant with very large leaves was spreading. It sure looked like a volunteer squash plant. Healthy and lush, it spread all over the slash pile, extending in every direction, and began producing fruit. A decorative gourd grew and ripened—as large and healthy as one you would get form the market. A few days ago three more were ready to be picked, the leaves of the plant were as huge and spreading as ever, and at least ten more gourds are ripening.

The pumpkin squash we tried to plant is surviving, but the one that grew on its own is thriving. Sometimes life is like this as well. We have goals and intentions, things we try hard to do—and often they work out, sometimes they don’t. Like the pumpkin in my yard. And then success will come when we least expect it—like the gourd plant behind my garage. That plant knows instinctively that this is where it wants to grow, the right conditions for it. Staying out of the way and letting it happen is the most helpful thing that I have done in growing these beautiful gourds. As the Tao te Ching says,

“Do you have the patience to wait Till your mud settles and the water is clear? Can you remain unmoving Till the right action arises by itself?”

Sometimes in life the best things are the ones that happen all by themselves, not the ones we try hard to achieve.

PRAYER:

God of nature and of humankind, god of pumpkins and gourds, may I learn to trust you.

May I see the wisdom in the ways of nature.

May I trust to the good fortune and abundance that are part of life.

May all of us keep striving and planning, trying to create order and beauty and peace in the world.

And may we recognize that beauty and love exist—everywhere, all around us.

Blessed be.

Rev. Drew Frantz

September 22, 2026