Saturday, November 20, 2010

God, Please Don't Pick These Flowers

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God, Please Don't Pick These Flowers

We humans have tales or legends that are ment to ease the pain of loss from death. The story of “The Rainbow Bridge” may comfort many when a beloved pet passes on. For human loss, especially the young and the especially good people, it is often said that God appreciates beauty and he is picking this beautiful flower to decorate his home in Heaven.

I am now passing out of middle age. Because I am a sinner, I have no special fear of being “picked” for my “beauty”. However, I do see the beauty in the flowers that are being picked near me. It has been my practice to lament these losses and to say prayers for their prominent display in God's house. My younger sister was the first of these, so many years ago. Then my brother. Followed by my closest friend. With the remembering of these bringing others to mind.

Of course it is not my place to be any judge of the beauty of any of the elements of God's garden here on Earth. But, as I look about me, I see, more and more, the potential of others beauty. Here are family members, friends, aquaintences, strangers of good repute, and, soldiers who are putting their lives on the line for me and my country.

With Jesus' caution: “Judge not, lest you be judged” in mind, it is still difficult to not see an occational weed, who's removal or reformation would add to the beauty and good order of the earthly garden. When my minds eye perceives one of these possible weeds, the gardener in me wonders at the picking of the flowers and the leaving of the weeds. Such a question seems to arise in the hearts and minds of all humans when they consider their losses.

The only explanation there seems to be, for not doing a thorough weeding is the caution that the flowers would be uprooted with the weeds. (This gives me comfort in that the presence of the flowers about me protect me from being uprooted.) And the only reason for weeds is the giving of free will to us humans. Free will being the unhindered choice of behavior, good or bad, without regard for consequences. We get to choose for ourselves to be a weed or a flower. I would like to be a flower, but there are so many temptations.

Now, recent revelations have shown me the hand of God hovering over my part of the garden. Heart disease and cancer threaten people close to me. I see shadows around some of my most favorite people. These things have added two lines to my regular prayers: “Oh God, give these for whom I pray, the things they need most” and “God, please, don't pick these flowers!”

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