The Unknown Garden

What, another blog entry so soon? Well, the ridiculously cold weather has me thinking/dreaming about spring. If you know me, you know how much I look forward to seeing those first spring bulbs send their shoots up through the snow and BLOOM! I have abundant (some would contend superfluous) photographic evidence of this passion. I know just where to chip away the snow and ice to find my precious spring bulbs. I know where the tiny purple crocuses will emerge, where the few yellow ones will be, and where to find the bigger, stripy ones. And then there’s my little patch of snowdrops! I love how these hardy, early flowers handle the typical setbacks of spring, and almost every year I get to post a picture captioned “snowdrops on snowdrops.”  I love when the spring rains decorate these early blooms with jeweled sprinkles that cling to every surface. I love these flowers when they’re opened up for the sun and when they’re closed up for the storms. I love when the first, lazy bees of spring roll around (with seeming delight) in the pollen of these early blooms. The earliest of spring flowers are a precious sign of resilience and beauty and promises kept after long, cold days of almost nothing.

Snowdrops on Snowdrops!

Here’s the rub. I am living in a new house now, with a new garden. I don’t even know if I have ANY spring bulbs to find! My new garden is filled with unknowns. I can tell that there are garden patches here, and I even have figured out a few of the flower varieties, with last year’s blooms poking their noses through the snow. What I can’t tell is what’s under the ground. Are there spring bulbs, waiting to emerge? Only time will tell. The “magic” of spring bulbs is that the work is all done in secret. You plant them in the fall and WAIT. In the spring, they emerge, give joy, and then die down to the point where you can’t even remember for sure where they were when it comes time to plant more the next fall. They are quiet and unseen reminders of hope.

Current view of my new garden

What will this garden hold? Will I find a kindred spirit in the former gardener? Of course, that is my hope. But my best guess is that there will be flowers here that I don’t recognize, that I will find new joys and new beauty as a gift from the former gardener. And it is entirely possible that there will not be any crocuses or snowdrops, my early spring loves, this year. This thought nudges me into remembering what I said in my New Year’s Day blog. I want to “keep my hands open to accept whatever comes my way, and to do it in the spirit of Romans 12:12, remaining ‘joyful in hope, patient in affliction, and faithful in prayer.’”

Gardens make such a good metaphor of life. I am so glad I serve a God Who gets His hands dirty, Who really is in control, Who gets down on His knees so I can plant alongside Him, and Who nourishes the beauty in my life. The unknown garden becomes less and less important as I focus on the known Gardener. We surrender – I surrender – illusions of control to the ONE Who sows and reaps, the ONE Who causes the rain to fall and the plants to grow, the ONE Who plans the whole garden. May the God of the universe and the God of each one of us be the Lord of my life. Amen.

The Unknown Garden

By Elizabeth Traff

We wait…

Winter roars

Snow drifts

Time plods

Temperatures drop

Breath fogs

Wind whistles

We dream…

Of sunshine

Of colors

Of rebirth

Of warmth

Of thunderstorms

Of spring

We wonder...

Fears arise

Worry encroaches

Excitement erupts

Anxiety unsettles

Plans develop

Eyes twinkle

We learn…

About trust

About acceptance

About hope

About friendships

About resilience

About God

We grow…

Flowers bloom

Life changes

Gardeners plant

Gardeners harvest

Years pass

Life ends

We RISE!