In the jungles of
Papua the men’s room is always easy to find: it’s located any place not
currently being used as a lady’s room. And
so it was at Sekame; no fancy signage, just a couple of bushes next to the
ditch at the side of the airstrip and I had found the vital facilities I was
looking for.
I looked down at the floor
of the ditch where something caught my eye as being out of place. Here, standing tall among the dirt and the
weeds, were wild orchids in all their delicate, regal beauty.
Orchids in the
ditch. Considered by some the most
beautiful flowers in the world…costly, sought after, highly prized. And here they are, in a ditch.
The thing is, the
orchids didn’t know they were in a ditch.
There they were, doing exactly what they were put on earth to do: bloom.
They screamed out God’s creative brilliance, his love of beauty and his desire
for us to be enraptured by that beauty. And
they are doing this in a ditch, just
like they would if they were the centerpiece attraction at a world class
botanic garden being oohed and aahed by professional flower people.
I pay way too much
attention to the context in which I find myself. Am I willing to fulfill what God has me on earth
to do when I find myself in some anonymous ditch in a backwater village deep in
the interior of Papua? Or do I put in the
effort to shine only when I have an audience of professional Christian people from
whom I might coax an ooh or an aah?
Am I willing to
scream out God’s creative brilliance, the beauty of who he is, by producing my
best work and allowing joy to rule in my heart even when all I see around me is
dirt, weeds and the steep walls of the ditch I’m in?
Thank you, God, for
orchids in the ditches.
2 comments:
Thanks for the post Nate! What a great encouragement to honor God wholeheartedly wherever He places us. Blessings to you as you serve him "in the ditch". And my you and your plane only be figuratively and not literally in the ditch! : )
Great to hear from you Barry. Brad was actually with me that day in Sekame... he took a set of orchids back home as well. Blessings on you!
Post a Comment