Ye Ould Wilde Garlick

I went for a walk today in search of some indian paintbrush. This flower is a quite beautiful red color, and I fancied a little to brighten my desk. Unfortunately, they have all gone into hiding and I could find none. As I was walking I came upon several small patches of small, white, star-shaped flowers. They're commonly known as wild garlic, but unless you crush the stems they smell nothing like garlic. They were everywhere, even where the road-construction crew had torn up the side of the road. I wondered at how fast these little flowers sprang up. They provided simple beauty to the landscape, and they smelled heavenly (when the stems aren't crushed). These sturdy flowers weren't there the year before, but over the course of the past twelve months they've taken over the neighborhood. It reminded me of the gospel. When we're first open to it, it doesn't seem very big. It wriggles into our hearts and minds in a very small way. We begin to change the way we live and act, but nothing drastic. As the years go by, however, it continues to multiply and grow inside us. Our beings are filled with the wonder of it, and before long it has taken over our minds and souls, our lifestyles and tastes.
I am speaking primarily of those who grow up with the gospel. They hear it every day, and it is always there in the backs of their minds growing steadily larger, until one day they see for the first time just how big it is - how much it has really taken over them. I am quite aware that there are those who do not grow up in the church and whose confrontation with the gospel is big and dramatic - Luther, for instance.
My life, however, very much reflects the flower illustration. It has taken me seventeen years to finally look around and see just how much of an impact the gospel really has on my life - how much it has really changed how I think, what I like, what I wear. They are all very tiny things - mere drops of water in a bucket - but I have learned, as Zechariah did, not to despise the day of small things. It is through small things that God does His most glorious work. It is through the fools, the weak, the poor, the inadequate, that His power shines through. For, as Paul says, "when I am weak, then I am strong."