I crank on the hose, feeling the grass beneath my feet as the sun begins its rose-colored descent, taking its violence with it. A violence that has cracked open the earth and drank it dry.

I begin to spray; large droplets of water shoot past my thumb and land on the cracked soil. This is long overdue, I think, thankful that my garden has survived another day in the ninety-degree heat.

Soon I hear him, peeling from the porch and tripping towards me in the way two-year-olds do.

I hold my breath and let it out, knowing the moment of serenity is giving way to something else entirely.

“Spray me, spray me, mommy!” He runs along the parameter of my hose’s reach, excited, yet shirking from the idea of that first cold shock. He waits for it, pleads for it, but he doesn’t intersect it.

I smirk and give way, forcing my thumb deeper into the hose as the water pelts his shirt and shorts. He gasps, his eyes grow wide, but then he’s running off again chanting, “spray me, mommy, spray me!”

His older sister, the middle one, soon follows suit and she’s running through the garden with her pigtails and princess dress flying behind her.

“Spray me, too!”

I look over my thirsty plants, giving them a “can you wait just a minute?” glance, as I water yet another one of my children, instead of them.

Soon they’re peeling off their clothes and streaking through the grass, running free and wild. Their skin glistens and their hair curls on their forehead. Their arms are flailing through the air with a force and abandon that skirts the edge of ferocity. They’re dancing in circles, catching the drops as they fall, so caught up in this garden dance that I now find myself a part of.

I smile and this time it reaches my soul, and I feel something break loose and push to the surface, like dew from the ground. I close my eyes and see green hues, feel the breath of the earth and smell its fragrance. I plead a silent prayer for this childlikeness that I know God delights in. It’s inconvenient, messy, all-consuming in its need, but a gift of holy adventure to a place much like Eden, where I also imagine two naked souls danced in the garden. There is no shame as that is a foreign agent, not the one from whence all life flows. Instead, there is trust, there is this understanding that we can ask, and we can receive. The cry from their lips is one of expectancy and joy.

You see, my children could run in front of my hose anytime they wanted to, but they don’t, because they have the innate understanding that receiving is far better that taking. The difference between the two is a chasm of cosmic proportions. I think over all the areas of my life where I strategized how to get my way or calculated the subvert manipulation tactic, only to grow imbittered when I don’t succeed.

These dancing, twirling nymphs know an ancient truth that I am hoping to learn.

I close my eyes, imagining God standing in a garden free of weeds and cucumber beetles, as He watches His children dance in the rain He sent. I can see the pleasure in His eyes, feel the warmth of His gaze and know that He painted the world with this same mossy shade of promise that I now inhibit.

Dare I believe, He has good things in store if I ask? Perhaps a good that exceeds my own small bargainings? 

How dare I not?

“Don’t bargain with God. Be direct. Ask for what you need. This isn’t a cat-and-mouse, hide-and-seek game we’re in. If your child asks for bread, do you trick him with sawdust? If he asks for fish, do you scare him with a live snake on his plate? As bad as you are, you wouldn’t think of such a thing. You’re at least decent to your own children. So don’t you think the God who conceived you in love will be even better?”

— Matthew 7:11 MSG