God’s Lilies

Years ago, I began counting the days I’ve spent waiting for Jesus to return. One year, as I counted the thousands of days, despair began to take root.

Angry at how far the Promised Land still seemed, I asked, “How long are You going to take?” Gently, He whispered, “Some lilies take a long time to bloom.” Unaware that any lily can take years to bloom, I googled it.

Among the search results was an article, “Ten of the Slowest Plants to Ever Bloom.”* Scrolling through the article was an interesting worship time.

At number nine was the Madagascar palm, which was only discovered in 2008. It made the list because it flowers so infrequently no one had noticed it wasn’t a regular palm. As I thought about this palm, God reminded me that though it may seem that He is just taking years to do the same work for me that He has accomplished in days for others, the flowers aren’t the same. At number six was the kurinji plant, which blooms so reliably every twelve years that some use it to track their age.

He reminded me that long delays do not mean uncertain results. At number one was the Himalayan lily, which grows to a height of nearly ten feet (three meters) and blooms after five to seven years. He reminded me that His ways are mysterious but always for my good. After long weekends parked in the sun, unopened for days, my car usually has a stale air smell, but that morning as I opened my car, I was greeted with the delicate smell of lilies. The smell faded faster than I wished, but the fact that God would freshen up my car with lilies just because He can etched the morning’s lesson in love as I realized that God loves me deeply and spends an insane amount of time orchestrating meaningful-to-me ways to remind me to trust His plan.

In His garden, every flower blooms in its time.

Melissa Martinez