Consider the Lilies

By Missey Butler
Guest Writer

You can almost hear it in the air. Like the fine tuning of stringed instruments on opening night, so also the great symphony of nature as she finds her pitch and makes ready her praises. She watches closely as the Heavenly Maestro lifts his baton, poised and ready to resound forth the light hearted melodies of spring as she makes her glorious debut!

A few weeks ago I was reminiscing as I sat on top of a large fallen oak tree in the middle of a wooded lot. It felt like home to me. As a young tomboy, you could always find me scavenging among the tall pines or bent over some trickling ravine, gazing at the tiny tadpoles, and fast moving minnows as they dodged the prodding of my stick. I loved the woods.

My mom and grandma could vouch for my love of nature, as I walked through the kitchen door with parts of it still attached to me in the forms of poison ivy, chiggers, mosquito bites and ticks. My brothers would laugh at me when I sat down for dinner speckled from head to toe with the lovely pink dots of calamine lotion.

As often as I can, I revisit my old friend, the woods. My favorite locations are usually far away from any of the intruding sounds of the nearby city. Whenever I’m there, it’s as if I’m in seventh heaven, completely captivated by the chirping, chattering, twiddles and tweets. With so much to take in, I quietly watch as the scampering squirrels play tag with each other among the backdrop of cascading honey suckle. I become startled by the rush of a host of black birds who suddenly exit in haste from high atop the leafy majestic crown of a huge grandfather Elm.

I am reminded that life is much more than the process of breathing or the pumping of a heart. It involves a sense of being. Implanted within every living creature is a purposed individual identity for which it was created, the total blue-print of its life form.

When a robin is born, no one has to tell it what it is supposed to be. It is fully conscious of the fact that it is a robin. No one has to teach it to behave like a robin, or how to eat worms or fly from branch to branch, for its behavior is imprinted in its LIFE.

The truth is, all of creation is like a great symphony being played by an orchestra, and some where, invisible to the naked eye, is the MASTER CONDUCTOR giving order and cohesion to the whole production.

Just think about if for a moment! Everything that has LIFE is totally dependent upon the God who created it, not just for its existence but for its form, its identity and its destiny.

While sitting in the woods, I happen to look down at a tiny patch of lavender flowers peeking through the ground cover of ivy. I began to think about some other flowers spoken of by Jesus in the gospel of Matthew when he said:

Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which to day is, and to morrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith? Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed? For after all these things do the Gentiles seek: for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things. (Matthew 6:28-32)

What a promise! The God who created you, me and every thing living, has insured us that we have no need to worry, that everything has been provided, within and without. All we have to do … is like the lilies of the field … simply be.