The first one ... or is it?

Today I enjoyed glorious weather and sunshine to get my flower garden ready for spring.  The annual clean-out includes trimming back perennial plants like salvia greggii, lantana, Russian sage, ruellia; getting excess leaves out of the beds; giving the rose bush a severe haircut; and treating for my ever-present foes, the fire ants.

As a younger woman, I would get the fever with everyone else and march down to the nursery to pick up a flat of annuals, most of which I killed - too impatient, too neglectful.  The idea of flowers was a thrill, but the reality of having them was a downer.  Then I became friends with an older couple who loved to garden.  They shared plants and confidence!  Since then, perennials have been my game.  Several of the items I am growing were gifts shared from others - the purple iris came from my grandmother Lizzy's garden; the white iris from my parents' house in the country; the scabiosa (pincushion flower) from Catherine Rall; the ruellia from Kathy Myrick; the wandering Jew from down at the church building.  So, as each awakens in its turn in the spring, I eagerly anticipate blooms and think of my sweet friends and family.

Now is the time of awakening - of the first things.  The first tiny leaves in the cluster of dry sticks that used to be a lantana, and even a little cluster of a bloom today:

Last week it was the first blossoms of the Bradford pear trees up and down my streets, early harbingers of what is to come.

And, even though in my mind it is "the first," in my spirit I'm reminded that this is the repeat of the creation story all over again that God has reenacted throughout the millennia. Each new bud, each new flower, each new leaf sings of the eternal faithfulness of God.

"Summer and winter, and springtime and harvest; 

Sun, moon and stars in their courses above:

Join with all nature in manifold witness

To Thy great faithfulness, mercy and love.  

Great is Thy faithfulness!  Great is Thy faithfulness!  

Morning by morning new mercies I see. 

All I have needed Thy hand hath provided. 

Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me."

Father, help me remember with each small creative act of the spring to see You there, and anticipate your creative work in me. And help me get rid of the weeds and leaves that might make me miss what you are doing.