We’ve had a modest home garden for a few years, and I enjoy going produce shopping in my own backyard, but truth be told: if I had to grow all my own food, I’d probably starve. It takes patience (something I do not typically have in abundance) and the right environmental factors (triple-digit summers don’t help) to cultivate a plentiful garden. Is it any wonder, then, why the Bible often uses plants as an illustration for our spiritual journeys and relationships? Growth is a slow and arduous process.

Planting a garden is an investment. It takes a sacrifice of time, money and dirty work. From tilling the soil to planting seeds, following up with water and fertilizer and pulling weeds, each step is important to the end result. Likewise, our relationships require a diligent investment of time and effort. People may use the phrase, “Love at first sight,” but sometime after the second glance, the relationship is going to take hard work, if it is to grow and thrive. A relationship that is left untended can wither up like an unwatered lawn in August.

The same concept goes for our relationship with God. We can tend the relationship with healthy things like prayer, Scripture and worship time, or we can let the relationship flounder while we go off and pursue our own interests. A word of caution from 1 John 2:15-16 (ESV): “Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world.” Worldly, sinful things are like squirrels that filch the first tomato on the vine: they can ruin the whole effort.

Whether or not we mean to prioritize, there are still only 24 hours in a day, and when we invest time and effort in things that do not build up (or worse, actively break down) our relationships with God and with each other, then we have made that investment a priority. For the benefit of every relationship we have, we would be wise to heed Peter’s advice to “grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” (2 Peter 3:18a, ESV).