by Assistant Editor Halee Matthews

It was a goner. Dead and gone. Lifeless. I was convinced.

Oh well, I tried, I thought as I tossed it into the backyard. I figured that was the last of it.

I was wrong.

It came back. From. The. Dead. Who knew a mint plant could come back from the dead? Not me, that’s for sure!

It had been sad and wilted, well on its way to being a dried herb. So I threw it out the basement door, figuring it would become some sort of minty compost.

But one week later, I opened the door and it was there. Alive. Staring at me. Accusing me of giving up on it.

Well, it’s just a fluke. A freak accident. It just happened to survive.

Oh but it didn’t just survive.

The next week, I opened the door and it had multiplied. We’re talking three mint plants now, tall and strong, with large minty leaves.

It’s just the right environment, I guess. The soil is right. I eyed the soil. It looked more like sand- the beach kind, where nothing grows but dry reedy-things. So? Crazier things have happened.

The next week? Seven. Seven mint plants, all about a foot tall with leaves almost equal to those on a nearby tree. They sat there, staring at me, reminding me of that clone from the Matrix that just kept multiplying.

I had visions of it taking over our basement, crawling up the sides of the house, strangling me, my last breath full of minty-freshness.

I had given up on it! The poor plant just wanted to live and I threw it away.

But we’ve made our peace now, the mint plants and I. (There are about twenty of them so they could easily overtake me.) But they stay on the outside of the basement door and I water them every now and then.

As I watched that one little mint plant grow (and grow and grow), I realized that giving up on it was the best thing I could’ve done. Why? Because letting it go gave it the opportunity to thrive.

Sometimes you’ve got to let something go to let it live. Sometimes you have to relinquish control. And God can take the things you thought were dead and gone and give them the chance to flourish in a way you never thought possible.