A God Who Sends Flowers

On Sunday, July 25, 2010, Beth Roper showed up at my garage door with a colorful bouquet of freshly picked flowers from Farmer Brown’s field in Montezuma. With that large, beautiful smile that only Beth can give, she handed them to me and said, “The Lord told me to bring these to you.” Little did she know that I had just played my last service at Grace Church earlier that day and I was in total grief mode. I will never forget her sensitivity to hearing and obeying God’s voice to comfort me in what was a great loss. God had sent me flowers.

Today, He sent me flowers again … from a still obedient hand yet this time an anonymous one.

I had been out running some errands; a common Monday morning routine. Checking on my mom; gathering her laundry; stopping by the pharmacy; picking up a few things at Publix. Just all normal stuff, but today I carried a sad heart. A grieving heart even. A heart that at times still seems so raw. No doubt December is the month that bears the heavy weight of losing men I really loved … and still love. Each year prior to the anniversary of my brother’s death, I recall those days as we stayed close and did what we could to help out. Of sitting vigil. Of gathering as a family around his bed as the angels escorted him homeward. And now this year will be my first Christmas without my daddy as he took his last exhale in the wee hours of December 28th of last year as his beloved wife of 67 years, my mom, stood next to him.

As I traveled from one location to the next this morning, I recognized my heaviness. I felt the holes in my body riddled by loss, and I don’t apologize for that, because I know that the longing and lingering pain is a testament to the great love I had for these men. I’m grateful I was given the privilege to love. And for them to love me.

So when I drove up to my house and I saw the Christmas cactus sitting on my doorsteps, my very first thought, even before I knew there was no name included, was, “God has sent me flowers again … to comfort me.” How much more personal can it get than that? 

I am so grateful for the one who brought that basket of “Malissa White” Christmas cactus. And I wish I could thank them personally and express my sincere gratitude. This one truly was the hands and heart of Christ today. But moreover, I am so grateful for a God who is so good; so caring, and so seeing. A God who is near to the broken hearted. A God who visits us in the night seasons. Yes, even a God who sends flowers to the funeral. 

My heart is completely undone this night.