Sunflowers

We've lived in Dulce for almost exactly three years, and for most of that time I have taken a daily walk. My walk leads me through town to the high school track, around the track, and back through town to our home. On my route I recently noticed that some of the sunflowers were full and beautiful... and some were missing all their petals, leaving just the middle section.

I've seen this before and never really thought about it, but this particular morning it struck me. I looked a little closer.

My inspection of the sunflowers revealed that the pretty ones with bright yellow petals had small immature seeds in the center. The bare sunflowers held fully mature, robust seeds. And that got me to thinking...

It seems to me that we Christians are a little like the sunflowers. When we're immature, we hold potential, but it is undeveloped. Our actions for Christ may look pretty; they may draw attention, but mostly to ourselves, not to Christ. I know that I personally have had times in my life when my work "for the Lord" was more self-serving than I'd like to admit.

And the plain sunflower, with all the petals lost, is a mature Christian who is full of the promise of new life. None of the attractive glitz. Just the seeds of faith. Just the seeds of Christian growth. Just the seeds of God's will.

Sometimes people will be drawn more easily to the bright beauty of immature faith, but patiently growing into maturity as a Christian brings eternal joy. So don't worry if your Christian service isn't a blazing parade with myriad onlookers and followers. Instead, continue to allow God's Spirit to change you, to develop you into the deep and mature follower of Christ that will serve God's Kingdom in everything you do.