Blooming Orchids

In the kitchen at the office lives an orchid plant. The lighting and heat and humidity seem to be the perfect environment for it to thrive. And thrive it does! It is often seen with gorgeous blooms, at times so heavy the stalk bends under their weight. It’s beautiful!

It is not *my* orchid; for I do not have luck with orchids. In fact, I’m known for inadvertently causing their demise. I’m so inept at it, that we joke about my needing to keep social distancing from the plant.

Recently, our Administrator (aka plant wizard) and I were in the kitchen at the same time, and I apologised… for the plant had gone from displaying many blooms to having none – I figured/joked that I must have breathed on it or something.

She assured me the plant was fine – the blooms had fallen, but the plant itself was fine; the leaves were thriving, the air roots poking out, there were even new spikes emerging. The plant was – and is - alive and well. The absence of blooms did not mean illness or death.

Our faith is like this: it encompasses all stages of growth and development. Faith reminds us that even when we aren’t blooming, we may be alive and well. The fruit that is worth bearing, as Jesus invites us to bear and share (Jn 15), can take some time – some tending, some rest, some growing periods.

Our ministries – the work we do – are the roots, they are the leaves, and at times they are the blooms. There is life in all of these; there is health in all phases. As new blooms cannot blossom where others exist, we are called to make way for what is appropriate for the here and now.

If we limit our vision to one mode of beauty (like the flowers), then we miss out on other amazing realities of the whole. If we define success only by one expression, we will be disappointed should that one area fail. If we expect things to stay the same, we are in fact embracing stagnancy, which is the opposite of life.

Faith reminds us to seek out signs of life as they are, and where they are: and to embrace the actual beauty and the potential therein – we never know what blooms may come with just a little care.