NEW GROWTH

"He also said, “This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man scatters seed on the ground. Night and day, whether he sleeps or gets up, the seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how. All by itself the soil produces grain—first the stalk, then the head, then the full kernel in the head. As soon as the grain is ripe, he puts the sickle to it, because the harvest has come.” "

-MARK 4:26-29-

This morning my routine was punctuated by new life.  

I have a vase full of pussywillow branches in my dining room and recently I'd noticed that they were starting to grow roots and that the catkins (new vocab word!  that's the fuzzy flowers!) were getting bigger.  Then today I noticed they'd burst out into their next phase.  It made me realize there are living things in my house.  Things with life all their own.  

And then I went into my nook, where I spend my time with God in the morning, and found this little purple flower had opened up today.  This plant (anyone know what it is?) is a survivor.  It came from a tiny sprout that turned up in the soil after my thyme plant had died from some plant rot during the summer.  I decided to water it and see what it would become, since it seemed like such a healthy little sprout.  And it grew and grew and grew, continuing to prove its heartiness, as it lives on a windowsill in the unheated nook.  And then it flowered.  Flowered!!  I never expected it to flower.  I mean, I hoped it would, but, honestly, it was the strangely strong sprout that survived after the woody thyme had succumbed to rot, so I assumed it would be something uglier and weed-ier.  And then it turns out to be this gentle blue flower!  It reminds me to stay patient and hopeful for the things that keep growing, even when I can't tell what exactly they are going to become.

"So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow."
-1 CORINTHIANS 3:7-