By Davalynn Spencer @davalynnspencer
We had a plant* in the living room that just didn’t fit. It had one long, leaning stalk with oddly colored leaves that never changed. It did nothing as far as plants go. But I knew it was alive because it hadn’t wilted.
Once a week I watered it along with the others—graceful peace plants, leafy philodendron, spreading Christmas cactus, etc. And every week it looked the same. No change.
For three years.
And then I moved it to the window.
When sunlight from a southerly exposure hit those fake-looking leaves, they started to change color. New leaves began to sprout. Even new growth on the gangly stem proved to be another branch. More leaves. More color.
How can a plant last three years with no growth and then suddenly sprout new body parts?
The phrase “come alive” took on new meaning.
In the Creator’s master plan, flora and fauna need three basic things to flourish: Water, food, sunlight. Without food and water, plants die outright. Without light, even filtered, they struggle along, never living up to their potential whether they have food and water or not.
It is the same with human life. We need the basics of water, food, and sunlight, but the principle drives deeper, into the very God-given breath in our lungs.
Without the light of God’s Son in our lives, we wilt, struggle along, and never quite reach our potential.
“I am the Light of the world,” Jesus told the people. “If you follow me, you won’t have to walk in darkness, because you will have the light that leads to life” (John 8:12).
Thank God there is a way to not simply exist but to thrive—grow, change, and bless others.
In Him was life, and that
life was the light of men.
John 1:4
As the peaks of a barn and house rose in the distance, memories of Pennsylvania faded, and Mary McCrae accelerated on the rough road, her body bouncing as much as her thoughts.
It had to be her aunt and uncle’s farm.
Mary’s hands tightened on the steering wheel. How surprised they would be when she arrived, in a motorcar no less! She’d not asked them to meet her at the train station in Cañon City, and she doubted they had telephone service. It was all part of the adventure, figuring out how she would get to the farm. But their steadfast love over the years assured her that she would be as welcome as Aunt Bertie had promised, regardless of how she arrived.
At a narrow track, a faded board on the fence corner said “Dodson,” and she turned toward the buildings. Excitement tingled through her arms—and quickly dwindled to dismay.
The outlying orchard was not as neat or trim as others she had passed, and no livestock grazed in the open areas. She rolled to a stop in front of a house that stood dreary and neglected, one shutter hanging askew on a front window.
Did she have the wrong farm?
She turned off the engine and sat in deafening silence. No chickens scratched in the yard. No dogs barked. No horses looked curiously from the corral.
Grasping one last lingering thread of hope, she got out and brushed dust from her sleeves and skirt. She patted her hair and put on a cheerful face, though she felt anything but. The front door yawned, and she poked her head inside.
“Aunt Bertie? Uncle Ernest?”
A chill crawled her neck with spidery speed. ~Hope Is Built
Inspirational Western Romance – where the hero is heroic.
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*I believe our curious plant is a variegated rubber fig plant – an oxymoron if I ever heard one. But whatever it is, in the sunlight it is thriving!
Love this. We forget just how much we need all three.
You are so right that we need the light of Jesus in our lives. Without Jesus, life is truly without hope.
His resurrection gives us the hope of eternal life with him. We lean on his every promise. It leads us toward his light and out of the darkness of this world.