struggleing rose

I tend to think, analyze, wonder, and contemplate in the morning hours more then any other time of day. I have even composed letters and stories in the shower and had to get out to write something down before I forget, which happens more often then not these days.

Last week Scott pointed out a struggling rose bush in my garden. I say struggling because last spring I tried to dig it up because it was in an odd place. It had three beautiful pink roses on it that summer, and after it was done blooming I truly thought I would put it someplace else. As I was digging it up though, it struggled to come out, and in the end it wasn’t a pretty site. It really wasn’t a bush it was more like a stick. I thought I got it all out, but low and behold what was left in the ground is trying it’s best to grow this year. It is 17” tall now and looks healthy. It grows along side of what I put in its place after I thought I had dug it all up.

Do I look for a deeper meaning here, u-betcha. That is the way my mind works. Life is like those roses, don’t you think. We all struggle with life in one way or another; we make choices we regret later, we don’t like this or that about ourselves, our jobs, our health, our relationships. Sometimes God will allow us to go through these struggles and difficulties in life in order to get our attention. He wants us in a position where we will have to be totally dependent on Him, to prove to us we cannot be strong enough within ourselves. In the bible God shrank down Gideon’s army from thousands to hundreds to fight a war against thousands. He wanted to show Gideon that He was in control, not the strength of a large army. Like that struggling rose we may need to be too weak in mind, body and spirit to try and figure it all out on our own. I read in a devotional by Joyce Meyer…. “We are not in line for a miracle if anyone but God can help us. There are times when we have too much going for us in the natural for God to give the victory.” We all need to stay humble and under Gods mighty hand in order to make it through all of what life may hand us, totally dependent on Him.

Yes that rose has yet to prove to me that it will produce after what I put it through, it may or may not it doesn’t matter because it is trying. Sometimes it takes those struggles to bring out our full potential in life.