Consider the lilies how they grow: they toil not, they spin not; and yet I say unto you, that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.
Luke 12 v 27
Yes, as the Lord Jesus taught us in this uni-verse, there is much wisdom that we can learn when we study the lily or the lotus. The lotus is known for growth. We need to grow intentionally and not haphazardly or accidentally in grace and truth. Like the lotus, we need to grow upward and outward towards the sun, the symbol of light and enlightenment. We need to grow wherever we are planted. We need to grow in the miry clay, sending deep roots into the soil and sub soil of our souls. We should not allow the murky waters to soil our souls but purify it to take it in through our shoots to water the different parts. We should not get weighed down with a sense of judgement and frustration with the corruption, violence, untruth and wickedness of the world around us. Instead, we should excel by contrast with the murky world. We should bloom and blossom not to draw attention to ourselves and to our great talent or brilliance or beauty but to point upwards to the invisible and ineffable glory of the Creator.
Let us be like the lotus, growing in serene beauty while rooted in the miry clay and surrounded by murky waters. Let us draw sustenance, strength and power from the surrounding negativity by transforming it by our mere presence and our thoughts and feelings into powerful positivity. We need not wear ourselves out with toil or worry or fear but open the petals of our lives every day and every morning towards the Lord, the Sun of Righteousness. Let us be contented with our lot or the portion the Lord has given us this day. The currents of happenings around us may sway us but will not shake us or sweep us away into the cascade and down the rocky cliff. The problems will throw up the solutions. The challenges will cough up the answer.
Our purpose is not in ourselves but in glorifying God. When people but see us or hear us, they should also praise the Lord for His goodness and greatness. The white of the lotus is a symbol of purity and holiness. The seed the lotus contains in its flower pod is a symbol of the spiritual seed we contain that will spread hope and love in this dark and murky world. The golden and many splendoured stripes running down the lotus petals to its base are the talents and good deeds that we do from our childhood to declare to the world that we are a species created and redeemed for a special purpose by the Lord. When ever the river or the pond is in spate or overflows, the lotus always its head above the water no matter how much it rises. Similarly, whatever our cause of distress or anxiety, we should not be overwhelmed but always rise above the flood waters looking out and above with hope and confidence. Our faith is unshakable and unsinkable. When our time comes to go, we can say with assurance, “ I have held my end up. I have withstood the flood and risen above the world. I am in the world but not of it.” Our feet might get a tad dirty in the miry clay and murky waters but our hands, our heads and our souls will never get dirty. The beauty and glory of our lives is not an artificial one that relies on props and accessories but it is a natural as well as supernatural glow, flow and grace. It is everlasting, eternal and will never fade away unlike the glory of wealth, wisdom, power, fame, glamour and pleasure. We are attached or rooted to our godly values but detached from our worldly desires.
Prateep V Philip
G. K. Chesterton's Father Brown says, "No man's really any good till he knows how bad he is, or might be; till he's realized exactly how much right he has to all this snobbery, and sneering, and talking about 'criminals,' as if they were apes in a forest ten thousand miles away … till he's squeezed out of his soul the last drop of the oil of the Pharisees; till his only hope is somehow or other to have captured one criminal, and kept him safe and sane under his own hat." G. K. Chesterton's Father Brown says, "No man's really any good till he knows how bad he is, or might be; till he's realized exactly how much right he has to all this snobbery, and sneering, and talking about 'criminals,' as if they were apes in a forest ten thousand miles away … till he's squeezed out of his soul the last drop of the oil of the Pharisees; till his only hope is somehow or other to have captured one criminal, and kept him safe and sane under his own hat."
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