VALENTINE AND THE BEES by Liz Manning

How can I resist the date as inspiration for my first post on this blog? Valentine: patron saint of… Now, don’t log off, it’s not going in the direction you’re probably expecting.

Valentine: patron saint (well, one of them) of beekeepers.

My husband took up beekeeping last year – he completed a basic course, joined the local beekeeping club, and got further experience helping with his friend’s hives. Now, he’s got his spot reserved in the new apiary, kit ready to go and hive about to be built, all waiting for a swarm to be collected when this year’s season arrives.

So when I was reading Psalm 121 again, this phrase suddenly made new sense:

‘The Lord is my keeper’.

I thought of a bee-keeper like my husband: not someone who locks things up, or puts them away safely in a cupboard, but someone who actively tends and cares for living beings, whose focus is their benefit:

Someone who provides them with what they need – a home (a hive), leadership (a queen), an environment in which to flourish (within flying distance of the pollen they need), sustenance when natural resources run low (beekeepers use ‘fondant’, a sugar solution, during the winter).

Someone who cares for them when ill, gathers them in from the wild to a safe place of their own, and who works with them to produce a harvest.

Someone who prepares the ground in advance, just as the new apiary was carefully sited next to the allotments (to gardeners’ and beekeepers’ mutual benefit), then the ground cleared of weeds, an even layer of earth put down, and finally a firm foundation stone (a paving slab) laid for each hive.

I think this is the kind of keeping God does for us, both in our spiritual and our writing lives.

We may be at different stages in the season or process. Perhaps you can look back on the foundations God laid down for your writing: essays at school, a book review here and there, an article for the church newsletter, a diary or prayer journal. Perhaps you are starting to see a harvest: a book published, a growing following on your blog, a reader’s comment on the impact of something you have written. Or perhaps you are somewhere in between.

But He is our keeper. He cares for us and wants us and our writing to flourish, just like my husband and his bees.

And God has made us word-keepers. But that’s another blog post!

May God bless the work of your hands

And the intent of your hearts.

May God bless the flight of the bees

And the product of the honey.

May you know the increase of favour and blessing

In all you put your hands to

And may you know the smile of God

As you set yourself to be a multiplier and a blessing to others.

(A Blessing For Bees https://patch.com/new-york/northfork/after-heartbreak-vandalized-hives-beekeeper-shares-blessing)

Liz Manning fits writing around being an Occupational Therapist, BB captain, wife, and mum to two adult sons. Or perhaps it's the other way round. She blogs regularly at 

https://thestufflifeismadeofblog.wordpress.com/