Beautiful pink petunia baskets! I just love them! I love the beautiful bright pink color that lifts my spirit as I look out my living room window and see them gently dancing in the breeze. I admire their brilliance as I work in my front yard. They welcome me home with their perfusion of glowing rosy colors as I pull into our driveway and come up to the front door. What a gorgeous, stirring sight! These have been the gifts my two sons have given me for Mother’s Day the last few years.
We recently had to be gone a few days, so I asked my sister, who is an expert gardener, to care for my plants. When we returned, she told me she could see spider mites just starting to get on one of my petunia baskets. Spider mites! No! Those are awful tiny bugs that I can hardly see, yet they ruin plants! I did not want to see my lush green baskets with their cheery pink blossoms reduced to dried brown leaves with a few wimpy flowers. I decided to take action and kill those mites! Malathion was the ticket. Spray it on, and it would kill them!
As I prepared to spray my plants, several thoughts fluttered through my brain. “I wonder how this will affect my blooms. Will it discolor them, or leave spots on them?” I hoped not! But I had to rid the plants of those mites, so I sprayed them. Within a short time, I knew what the spray would do to my beautiful pink flowers. They wilted and turned a dark purple brown. They were no longer the bright happy crimson blossoms dancing in the wind.
As I spent time over the next several days cleaning off the dead flowers so new lovely pink ones would emerge, I thought how my life is somewhat like those petunia baskets. There are times when life seems lovely, happy, and all is going well. Then something happens. Suddenly life seems to be out of control or on an uneven kilter. Perhaps there is a big disappointment, an irregularity in a relationship, or even an unsettled feeling in my heart that something isn’t quite right. Do I realize that I may have a “bug” and God may be trying to get my attention? He sees me totally – my thoughts, my motives, my desires – more clearly then I see them. Is there some attitude, thought pattern or desire that needs to be eradicated or changed? What is God trying to show me? Am I willing to meet with Him and let Him speak to me, showing me the issue? Or will I fight Him and keep going my own stubborn way? Will I allow the “bug” to eat at me, changing my relationship with God from a vibrant, trusting, joyful one, alive with His Spirit, to a dry brittle list of rules that eventually brings death?
God knows what is best for each one of us. He sees the beautiful, whole person that we can become – if we will just allow Him to slowly transform us. When the “bug” enters your life, will you turn to Him? Will you allow Him to “kill the bug” so that you can move forward in peace, inner health, and joy?
Praying for the eradication of bugs!
Lisa
