The end of our back garden grows wild; last year I cut back the brambles, but they only grew again. We enjoyed the berries they produced, so this year I let them sprawl. Most evenings, I pick the shiny ebony-coloured fruit, drop them into my little ceramic bowl, painted with green scroll-work, and feel a joy rising up in me. Soft, golden light or bluish grey cloudy. Breeze or wind, even a few raindrops, it doesn’t matter; somehow, I feel God’s presence in that moment, that place. Blackbirds serenade but more often, it’s me singing out to my heavenly Father. “Thank you Father for this wonderful provision of food that I didn’t have to work for,” except of course to climb among the brambles and carefully search with my fingers avoiding the thorny undersides of the leaves. Occasionally, the berries are too ripe and collapse in my fingers, dripping them with purple, but the berries still go in the little bowl for tomorrow’s muesli. I avoid thorns scraping my legs by firmly planting my feet on the brambles as I reach far back in the growth. I bend low to discover the hidden treasures or stand at a different angle to find all the ripe ones. If I don’t get them, they’ll go to seed. The magpies, wood pigeons, crows, blackbirds, and doves decline, thank you very much.

But today, it was time to cut the brambles back. They’re picked out. They never produced a massive amount, just what we needed, though one day I had enough of a bounty for my husband to make a blackberry crumble. It’s been a long time since we’ve had such a treat.

Tomorrow is brown bin day—pronounced “bean,” here in Yorkshire, so today was the day to prune. Between some annoyingly long shrub branches that I finally reached with the ladder (thanks to my husband for his steadying hand), and the chopped brambles, the bin is full. Satisfying.

What simple provision has God made for you in your garden or elsewhere?