“You will find Me only when you seek Me with all your heart."
~ Jeremiah 29:13
She’d never forget that call. "House fire," was all Kelvin said. His voice sounded like the words were formed
of smoke, his lungs charred. The line
went dead.
Kara’s drive home passed in a blur: she remembered no
traffic lights, no turning from one street to another, not even parking behind
the fire truck. Their home resembled
something from a horror movie - twisted plastic and charred wooden posts. Nothing to salvage, not a single thing.
Eleven weeks later, Kara turned the corner onto their former
street and braced herself. She needed to
discuss rebuilding plans with the contractor, but the thought of seeing
that empty lot, where her family’s house had burned to the ground, sickened her.
Kara knew she should be grateful that everyone had escaped
unharmed. But she couldn’t help
wondering why God left them nothing to start over with but dirt … and
sunflowers?
She stopped the car and rubbed her eyes in disbelief. Among the dry-looking weeds and chunks of
broken concrete, there was a field of cheerful yellow sunflowers - dozens of
them - growing where their house once stood.
They’d never grown sunflowers. None of their neighbors did either. The contractor explained they’d started
springing up in the lot (and only theirs) over the past few weeks.
Kara stared at the vibrant
flowers. They must be a sign from God, a
promise that life would blossom there again.
The flowers also reminded her of a basic spiritual truth: that He’d be
found by those who sought Him passionately (Jeremiah 29:13).
If flowers were known for their personality type, sunflowers
would be classified as optimists. Kara
had often marveled at how sunflowers stood up straight and tall, always
pointing in the same direction. They constantly
pivot to face the sun as it moves across the sky during the day. But they also rotate 180 degrees during the
night to greet the early morning sun – a behavior scientifically known as
heliotropism.
When everything is dark and bleak, the sunflower turns itself
until it finds the little sunlight that peeks through the clouds and it turns
its face that way. It focuses on the
positive.
Wouldn’t it be nice to be like the sunflower? To turn our backs on the negativity and face
the brightness of possibility? Just as
the sunflower closes up and loses some of its luster in the dark, so do we lose
our bright smiles, enthusiasm and exuberance in the darkness of negativity.
Yet God reveals His intimate love for us in an intriguing
way, pointing us toward the sun, teaching us to lean in and press on, reflecting
joy, beauty, and grace. And all through
a simple sunflower.
Father God, help me stand tall like the
sunflower; beautiful, bold and bright. Like the sunflower, guide me to always look
towards the Son. And remind me that even
during the dying process, that their seeds provide life, not death. Amen (by Martha
Vetter)
