If you know me some–you know if I’m handed a bouquet of flowers, they’ll shrivel to nothingness within a day or two and surely go under-appreciated. I’ve probably warned you–I’m not wooed by them and I don’t like the smell and really, I have no clue how to tend or take care of them. But if you know me lots–you’ll know I prefer my flowers wild and unruly, visible from rooftops and windows-down road trips, vivid color speckling plains of dry ground. I’ve grown up craving wildflower season, spending my Aprils peeking out of oversized open kitchen windows, just waiting to see where they’ll pop up this time around. Scattered in little pockets all over four acres, in every nook of my childhood backyard. I’ve always loved the wildflowers.

They sure aren’t bouquet-ready, they don’t like to be told where to stay, they call the messiest places home. They’re the masters of consistency yet still-a-surprise, lovely yet growing wild and untended in the most unexpected places. Only the Creator knows where they’ll land, and they didn’t put themselves there. He thought it out–put them each right where He wants them, to cover lifeless fields like carpet. He set them there, patches of color amongst the grays of sidewalk cement and highway medians and unkempt backyards–so we’d consider them, so we’d look at how they still grow. Unpredictable, going wherever the wind carries them, landing amongst weeds and dirt and who-knows-what just to spice up the place. They’re reckless and windblown and free and beautiful, handcrafted with His intricate detail; they bring Life to what’s dry and fix eyes on what’s never-noticed. No one’s watering them or pruning them or prettying them up–and still they catch your attention.  Consider the wildflowers. Look how He’s enthralled by them, how a single wildflower outdid the king’s finest attire, how He lets each one bear His splendor and His color and His Life! Look how they still grow!

He tells disciples of that day and today’s day to consider the wildflowers–because we’re a whole lot like them. We can’t predict where we’ll land next season, and we sure didn’t place ourselves here. We’re messy and windblown and alive in season, and the world ought to see us speckled bright and beautiful in places of ordinary gray. To His audience of worries and little faith, thinking today’s in small hands or incapable hands or no hands, he pleads, “Won’t you just consider the wildflowers? Look how they still grow.” If the Lord takes care of the flowers of the field, which are here today and gone tomorrow, how much more will He take care of you! He’ll color you. Maintain you. He’ll always notice you, consider you. Watch you, grow you, move you. Occasionally uproot you. Stretch you up up up to the sunshine and to Himself. He’ll be always enthralled by you. So take to the weeds and the dirt and traffic-lined highway medians, assemble beside the others into a patch of wild color and someone’s bound to notice. Settle roots deep where you’re planted–willing, eager, bright, expectant–because He thought it out and you’re catching eyes of onlookers and He promises you’ll still grow.

consider the wildflowers of the field, look at how they grow! they do not labor or spin, yet Solomon in all his glory was not dressed as beautifully as they are. and if God cares so wonderfully for wildflowers, which are here today and gone tomorrow, oh how He cares for you–you of little faith. | Matthew 6:28-30

Thanks for springtime wildflower season and eyes that have always noticed. Take me where You wish–I trust You’ll pretty me up and grow me and You’ll go right there with me. I’m ready! I trust Your winds.