Reflections on a Flower
How Nature Reveals Our God
Jesus once said:
Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they labour not, neither do they spin. But I say to you, that not even Solomon in all his glory was arrayed as one of these.
This beautiful passage is well-known but it’s actually not my focus at the moment. The Song of Songs caught my attention, in chapter 2 wherein we find the Groom saying:
I am the flower of the field, and the lily of the valleys. As the lily among thorns, so is my love among the daughters.
The Song of Songs is no mere human work of love; it is more than that, a divine work by God that portrays his intimate relationship with his people. It’s fascinating that the Lord chose compare both himself and his Bride, the Church, to the lilies.
Remember when I quoted what Christ said in the Gospel of Matthew? The Song of Songs is Solomon’s song, and while we find Solomon comparing himself to a lily, the lilies are still far greater than he ever was. And yet God also likens himself to this flower. It is Christ and the Church that are together the lilies in a sea of thorns.
All the beauty that we see around us is a reflection of God, and yet not simply as a mere designer. Nothing is beautiful in itself because nothing exists of itself. The beauty of the world is beautiful only so far as it is a small part of God’s character and attributes and being. Christ is the lily, and the butterfly, and the dove, and the waterfall, and the onyx, and everything else that radiates beauty.
This has particularly profound implications when considering meeting Christ face to face in heaven. It will be, I believe, like the grand sum of everything beautiful that we have and have yet to witness, without any of the taint of sin, all at once in the most unimaginable burst of beauty for all eternity.
Our minds are not meant for concrete jungles, because that is everything God is not. And that is why we take such pleasure in the natural world around us, why we long for an escape from the brutal lie that modern architecture has raised: because it is all a reflection of the God who wishes us to take ultimate pleasure in him, never ceasing, forever joyous.
