A Place of Quiet Repose

“I have 10,000 engagements of state today, but I would prefer to spend the day out here…studying dandelions and marveling at…spider’s webs…Do you have any idea how inconvenient that is?  How idiotic will it sound?  I have a political career glittering in front of me, and in my heart, I want spider’s webs.” – William Wilberforce in the Movie “— Amazing Grace, the Movie, 2006

We human beings are funny things, so enamored and befuddled by all the complexities of what we supposedly need to accomplish; so worried about this and obtaining that; so busy with making a living that we never have the time to really live.  We live hurried, harried and obsessive lives, and as a matter of course, we never take the time to marvel at the impressive intelligence behind the delicate intricacies of the natural world created for us.  We seemingly never have the time “to marvel at spider’s webs”. 

In the fictional movie, The Last Samurai, the Japanese Lord, Katsumoto made this statement as he stood gazing at a veritable carpet of pink apple blossoms on the trees in his courtyard garden.

He said,

“The perfect blossom is a rare thing.  You could spend your life looking for one, and it would not be a wasted life.”

By the way we live our excessively busy contemporary lives, I doubt many of us would agree with that statement.  But it does reveal at least one true reality, that perhaps the answer to the worry-filled, stressed out lives we live, may often be found in the very place we never thought to look…in the landscaped flower gardens of our backyard.  Perhaps, they have something to teach us about life; about God himself, that we’ve never considered before?

You might be surprised to learn that the Bible tells us to do this very thing!  The Psalms remind me that if I “lift up my eyes to the hills”, the natural question that should come to my mind is, “where does my help come from?”  A mountain view of the world can often help us to put the impossible situations we’re facing into their proper perspective.  Proverbs tells us to consider the infinitesimal but diligent ant, if we want to learn about the wisdom of industry and the folly of laziness.

Perhaps it is in our landscaped garden; this place of quiet repose, that we can take the time to do what Jesus commanded us to do…learn not to worry.

“See how the lilies of the field grow”, says Jesus in Matthew chapter six. 

“They do not labor or spin”, yet God ensures that they are clothed in the pristine beauty of creation.  That is, without any human intervention to help them grow; with no gardener but himself to tend them; without the aid of fertilizer sprinkled by human hands, God ensures that wildflowers not only grow but flourish; blanketing the countryside in swaths of gorgeous color, in every various combination imaginable.

 Now, I don’t know that much about flowers, but I have read that the color we see in flowers is actually the result of reflected light from various plant pigments. These pigments of color, such as the red in roses and yellow in marigolds, are found in pigments that are decided upon in the hereditary genome of a plant’s DNA.  The purpose of these colors is to attract birds or insects, which in turn help the flowers to cross-pollinate and reproduce themselves.

So, who decided what color each flower should be; who mixes and matches colors on a molecular level the way a painter might do with his palette? Obviously, God is involved in all of that minute scientific detail.

 So beautiful is the splendor of these naturally occurring wonders that there’s no comparison between the beauty of man-made innovation, and that which God has done in one single flower; none of it can even hold a candle to what God does on a beautiful spring day when he blankets the hillside with lilies drenched in sunlight.

Now, it’s important to understand why Jesus is giving us this science lesson. He’s attempting to teach us something significant about God.  Really?  What can you learn about God by looking at a flower?  Well, this particular theological truth for one:   That God is a God of dazzling creativity and loving attention to the needs of his creation.

But, is God really that concerned with my life?  The ancient Epicurean philosophers never thought so; they reasoned that if the gods were truly gods at all they couldn’t possibly be that concerned with what we feeble humans consider important.  There are even contemporary arm-chair philosophers who have similar views even today.  So then, what we discover in this is that Jesus’ theology is really radical stuff!   According to Jesus, God is intensely interested in lives of ordinary people.  How do we know that?

Just look at how he tends his garden—the world and everything in it.  If he cares for the birds of the air; the grass of the field and the flowers of the earth, then by simple inductive logic, we should know by now that God is not about to let us go through life without giving us what we need to survive, and even thrive.

Secondly, I don’t know if you’ve noticed, and I’m sure you have, but flowers do not hang out long.  They’re here for a short time in dazzling brilliance, and then they’re gone.

 Is it not remarkable that God would spend so much time and energy; creativity and attention to detail; on something as delicate as a flower; that is here today…and gone tomorrow?  Why would he do that?  Why put so much beautiful detail into something so fleeting; so short-lived?   This is the wonder of God!  Perhaps, he’s teaching us something about life itself.  Life is beautiful, but it doesn’t last. 

Therefore, we only have so much time, to do what he put us on the planet to do.  Yet how often do we spend the life he’s given us on things that are so trivial…so transitory?  Our lives here, are seasonal…and fragile.

But there’s one last thing the beauty of my garden teaches me about God.

Sitting amid the noise and flurry of creation; in the shadow of all that’s green and growing. The simplicity and scientific sophistication of the natural world leads me to what I think is an obvious conclusion about the God who made it.

God must be good!  Even more of than I think!   Looking at the beauty of the natural order around me, I think to myself, the evil god that atheists often accuse him of being doesn’t jive with the wonder of which I’m now a part.  I realize as Kari Jobe sings, that when life isn’t going my way; when I’m discouraged, despondent, broken and questioning; when I walk into my little garden and notice all the things that have grown up overnight as I’ve slept; I realize that God has been at work in my little garden the whole time, as he has been in my life…the whole time.

This I know, that healing and hope happen in the presence of God.  And it has often happened in my little garden where I go to meet him.  And this I also know about Jesus, when I’m hurting and broken, he always comes for me.  He comes to sit in the dust of my brokenness.  He speaks loving and comforting thoughts to me even when the disappointments and failures of life have left me a puddle of goo on the floor.  Even then…especially then, he’s never left me alone.

Perhaps that’s why at times, I feel like Wilberforce once did; I’ve got a thousand things to do, but I’d rather stay in my garden and wonder at spider’s webs and perfect blossoms.