The flowers that are bent on perfecting themselves, by becoming double, end in barrenness, and a like barrenness comes to the soul whose interests are all concentrated upon its own spiritual well-being, heedless of the needs around.
The true, ideal flower, is the one that uses its gifts as means to an end; the brightness and sweetness are not for its own glory; they are but to attract the bees and butterflies that will fertilize and make it fruitful. -L.T.
God’s Anomalies
Sometimes He removes life’s carpet of flowers and pools of great joy, replacing them with insurmountable barriers to our own pain and chagrin.
Take a bunch of flowers, a bunch of roses or any other particular kind of flower.
The difference between a bunch of flowers which are all alike, all sharing the same life, and the root and the plant, is a very great big one.
Well, I shall have this difference that, whereas the bunch of flowers has the life, it just goes so far.
And that is the difference between a congregation, so many Christians, or units coming together as units, and a spiritual organism, a local expression of the Body of Christ: and it is the Body which is God's thought, not a congregation, not a bunch of flowers.
But oh, the Lord's people are so much like the bunch of flowers!
Parent’s Prayers
Yesterday it was my birthday and I received a special present from my daughter. Oh, it was not a box of chocolates, a bouquet of flowers – nor my favourite perfume. In fact, it was not anything tangible – but rather she gave me a list of scripture verses.
When the advantages of grace do not call forth praise to the Father, when He is not prominently before the soul, as the source of everything possessed, then the gifts take the place of the Giver in the heart, and must soon lose their vigor and value like flowers cut away from their roots.
There may be aprice attached to it; misunderstanding, and loneliness,and much besides; but if you are so open to the Lordthat nothing else matters, and you mean to walk withGod whatever the cost, no matter what people say youought to do as (in their thought) a part of a greatChristian order or religious machine, you will come intoall God's secret thought as naturally as a flower opens tothe sun, and you will be making discoveries and findingthat there is a vast realm of meaning and possibility andcapacity and power that you never dreamed of.
In Isaiah 40 we read these words: The grass withers, the flower fades, heaven and earth will pass away, but the word of our God will stand forever. Isaiah 40:8 Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful.
The bud, the blossom, or fruit, most fragrant of Christ, is the one which nobody knows what it cost me but Himself; and where one had hardly noticed it; like the beautiful wild flowers in the hedgerow, contending with bushes and briars, to shed their fragrance on the unthankful or unthinking traveller going by.
Songbirds chorus their glorious hymns of praise, while bouquets of flowers unfold the fragrance of their multicoloured petals in a stunning show of praise and joy to the One who clothed the grass of the field; to the One who cares for the tiny sparrow.
The One Who fashioned furniture in the humble carpenter's shop, was the eternally existent One Who flung stars into space, and Who formed, fashioned, and filled the empty void with a carpet of living plants, fruit, flowers, and trees.
Through a series of beautiful examples, Jesus points out that both the birds of the air and the flowers of the field neither fret for their food nor worry about their clothing, but are graciously cared for by the Lord... a poignant reminder that God's blood-bought children are infinitely more precious to Him than pretty flowers or feathered foul.
If the birds of the air and the flowers of the field are fed and clothed so beautifully, don't you think that your Heavenly Father is able to supply all your needs? - were Christ's reassuring words.
Each plant, shrub, tree, and flower was given the inner seed of life to reproduce after its own kind, in preparation for that day when God would give every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth, and every tree that has fruit with seed in it as food for mankind.
We are also encouraged to think about the provision God has made for animals, and all wildlife - for birds of the air and the trees and flowers on the hillside.
We read in Psalms, He gives drink to every beast of the field and the wild donkeys quench their thirst. And in His Sermon on the Mount, He calls us to consider the birds of the air and the flowers of the field.
We are to reason that IF God has provided such abundance for common little birds, and dresses insignificant, wayside flowers in such beauty, surely He will care for those who have become His children, by faith.
What could be simpler than to consider a little wayside flower that dances in the sunlight, nods its head in the breeze, and bends its stalk with the wind, before shedding its sweet-smelling petals and hiding once again in its earthy bed - waiting for spring to call forth new shoots to declare the glory of God, and demonstrate once again the wisdom of His hand.
When we consider God's abundant provision for a simple little flower..
The special interest and intricate care that God places on the beautiful adornment of a wild wayside flower, which blossoms today, but tomorrow quickly fades and is cast into the oven and burnt in the noonday sun, should create in us a confident trust in God's faithful provision for each of His children.
The flowers of the field grow and are attired in simple beauty without care, labour, planning, management, or emotional worries!
The host of earth would compose of plants and trees, herbs and flowers, birds and fish, creeping things and all the great creatures that filled the earth.
All believers should walk in humility of heart and rejoice that their name is written in the Lamb's Book of Life, for everyone's earthly life, whether rich or poor, is as fleeting and temporal as the wayside flower or the grass of the field, but OUR hope is in Christ.
The earth is to rejoice, the sea is to roar, the mountains are to break forth in shrill shouts of joy, and the meadows are to clothe themselves with flocks of sheep and array themselves with sweet-smelling flowers, as a tribute to the great God Who made them all.
He goes on to compare the consequences of such a life with the withering effect of the blistering sun or the searing wind on the fast-fading beauty of a drooping flower.
He describes how speedily the prideful pursuits of a rich man will pass away: No sooner than the sun rises with a scorching heat than the grass withers; the flowers falls and the beauty of its appearance is quickly destroyed.
Christ's simple lesson about the birds of the air and flowers of the field should expose the futility of anxious strivings and futile cravings, for God provides for the simple sparrow and dresses the lovely lily of the field in a magnificent gown.
What is more insignificant than a little wayside flower or the grass of the field, and yet Christ used a simple wild lily to demonstrate the gracious care and loving concern our heavenly Father has for each of His blood-bought children.
Jesus challenged His disciples to consider the flowers of the field, because God in His providential goodness and grace adorns each one beautifully, with the most colourful array.
Jesus pointed out that the simple wayside flowers don't sew, they don't spin, they don't till the field or gather-in the harvest, and yet God even cares for their meagre needs.
By saying that Solomon in all his glory and greatness was not dressed as beautifully as the simple little insignificant wayside flower, was not intended to suggest that God did not care for Solomon - but indicated that our heavenly Father provides for absolutely ALL the needs and necessities of life. If God takes such care to clothe an insignificant little wild lily, growing at the side of the road – how foolish to allow anxious thoughts to flood our minds.
How often we need to remember His loving provision and tender-mercies towards us ALL.What could seem less significant than a broken reed, a tiny sparrow, a widow’s mite, or a little wayside flower, but God takes and uses such insignificant, everyday, mundane things and then He contrasts them with the opulence of the wisest, wealthiest man that ever lived in order to demonstrate His unconditional love and superabundant grace towards us – reminding us that He knows us personally, loves us unconditionally, and cares for each of us individually.When the Lord Jesus takes such care to get His point across to us, perhaps we need to take note of what He is saying.
Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? And using the little birds of the air and the fragile flowers of the field, Jesus gently explained that if God showed so much care and concern for birds and flower, should they not trust Him to supply all they needed according to His gracious goodness and lovely character?
And just as the Spirit of God caused the breath of life to trigger the creation into being and breathes new life into the one who is born from above, He is also the One Who causes flowers to fade and the grass to wither with a single blast of His nostrils.
But Israel would not harken to the Word of the Lord, and the prophet Isaiah used withering grasses and the fading flowers of the field to illustrate the transient nature of mans’ life, in an attempt to encourage Israel to repent of their sin, leave their apostate ways and turn back to the Lord.
Isaiah used the familiar grasses and flowers that grew everywhere to show the contrast between with the permanence and stability of God’s eternal Word, with the fleeting nature of wayside grasses and fading flowers, for the grass withers and the flowers fades; but the word of our God stands forever.The stark comparison of the fleeting life of a frail little flower with the transient passage of human existence is intensified by the striking contrast of the permanently established and eternally enduring Word of God.
How feeble and frail is the transitory, impermanence of all humanity and yet how steadfast and secure is the Word of the Lord – for God has even placed His Word above His holy Name.All human life is like grass, which appears as nothing more than evaporating vapour, which lasts for a little while but quickly vanishes away. Man’s glory is likened to both the grass of the field, which dries up in the noon-day sun and the short-lived flowers, which droop and drop and wither away when the breath of the Lord blows over them.
The Lord intimately knows how we were formed and how fragile our lives are: For He Himself knows our form; He is mindful that we are nothing but dust. He also understands the brevity of our lives: As for man, his days are like grass; like a flower of the field, so he flourishes.
The life of mortals is like grass, they flourish like a flower of the field; the wind blows over it and it is gone, and its place remembers it no more.
He understood that in God's sight, All men are like grass, and all their magnificence and glory fades like the flowers of the field, as recorded in the book of Isaiah.
He had, no doubt, studied the prophet's writings and recognised that the brevity of man's life can be compared with the fleeting passing of grasses in the field, for he quoted the gloomy truth: All flesh is like grass, and all its glory fades away like the flower which shrivels up, for, day by day, we witness this fact in our everyday lives as we watch the grass withering away and flowers fading before our eyes.
Every little blade of grass or any simple wild flower or fauna, provides a beautiful example of God's abundant provision for his children and the constant care He shows to those that are His.
If the Lord is sufficiently interested in clothing the grass and dressing wild flowers in their lovely colourful garments that are alive one day and shrivelled up the next, how much more must He care for His born-again children.