The Lone Sunflower

The time is nearing when we must close Wildrose Cottage for the summer season. Flowers are still blooming in the beds and my herb garden was prolific this year due to an abundant rainfall. Autumn color has not made an appearance, but you can feel it in the air. Winter is waiting, just around the corner. Summer seems tired of itself, ready to return to the earth.

Last evening, we drove the seven miles south to the farm where I grew up and where my sister and family still live. Just one last visit before flying home, I said. While walking through the late summer gardens, I noticed a lone sunflower, set apart from its fellows that were standing in neat orderly rows surrounded by a sturdy wooden fence. Somehow, this one sunflower seed had escaped the enclosure and was growing alone, apart from the sunflowers that held their heads up toward the sun. Outside the fence, the lone sunflower struggled on alone, bedraggled, worm eaten, alone in the harsh elements of rain and sun and wind. The large head was bowed to the earth. I had to have that picture.

The scene reminded me of God’s sheep together in the sheepfold, safely enclosed, together through the storms, the harsh elements, the attacks of predators, but still standing together, heads up, enfolded in God’s love, His care, watched over by the shepherd, by the shepherdess.

No marvel that Jesus went searching for the one sheep outside the safety of the sheepfold. Survival outside the fold is rare, the dangers are imminent, and the comfort and support of other sheep is missing.

How vivid are the lessons of nature! The patch of sunflowers enclosed together were hearty and colorful, filled with seeds, while only a few feet away, the lone sunflower struggled to survive, to produce, lacking strength to hold up its head and stand alone in the waning summer evening.

God’s people need each other and most of all; we need Him to set the parameters in our lives, to structure our life according to His will, the way that is best for us.