Tag Archives: roses

Wilted Flowers… Wilted Souls

Based upon  a 2013 CNN article, roughly 224 million roses are grown to prepare for Valentine Day shoppers.  Beside candy, roses have become a symbol for this special day, with the average person spending $130 to impress their significant other.  Unfortunately, it doesn’t take long for these expensive flowers to die.  Life can be prolonged by adding fresh water daily and trimming the stems.  Yet, in the end, the smell of flowers will fade, wilt and end up in the trash.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=twac4ZpDOpw

The human soul can relate to the final resting place for roses.  Individuals who are quiet, shy or wonder why no accepts them for who they are, often wilt like flowers.  The lack of communication, intimacy and relationships can weigh on a heart, resulting in loneliness.  Unless a soul experiences good news, hope or something positive, faith can fade into oblivion.  Like a deer that pants for water on a hot summer day, those that thirst for temporary pleasures will taste the sourness of disappointment.

According to the Bible, the soul finds rest in God alone, Psalm 62:1.  Though many will try other avenues to fill this void, nothing can satisfy like Jesus; just ask the woman at the well, John 4.  Mankind may try to stop the grass from withering and flowers from falling off their stems, yet the only cure to wilted souls is the Word of God, Isaiah 40:8.  If the thought of a cold dark winter has brought you down, may the promise of Romans 8:38-39 sustain you when all seems lost.

by Jay Mankus

Broken Pottery

With the recent success of modern art, beauty is often in the eye of the beholder.  This same logic can be applied to self-esteem.  If an individual attains success in academics, athletics or socially, this person may feel like a bouquet of roses.  On the other hand, if one experiences a regular dose of defeat, failure and setbacks, they might feel like shattered glass, trying to pick up the pieces of their life one day at a time.

While most people think of David as the second king of Israel, he spent several years in isolation, warned by his best friend Jonathon to flee from his jealous father, King Saul.  In the psalms, David  pours out his heart to God, trying to make sense of the pain he was enduring.  This is where we feel David’s  raw emotion, “I am forgotten by them as though I were dead; I have become like broken pottery,” Psalm 31:12.

Depression is an unfortunate circumstance of life.  God allows people to experience trials in life so that they may become mature and complete, James 1:2-4.  However, this process includes mess ups, mistakes and unfulfilled expectations.  Though you may currently feel like a piece of broken pottery, the Great Potter, Abba Father, has eternal plans to hold you together, 2 Corinthians 4:16-18.  May the power of Holy Spirit be the spiritual glue to fix our bodies comprised of broken pottery.

by. Jay Mankus