Patience While You Bloom

What's the worst part about planting a flower? Waiting for it to grow. Now this can be an analogy for many different parts of our lives, but let's look at two. The first analogy I see here is the patience you need during a situation. God uses various trials in our lives to help us grow, even if we don't see it at the time. Just like roses have to withstand through sometimes horrible weather, we have to withstand trials in our lives. Trials? For our good? Yes. At the end of the day, the trial you are going through is making you stronger. When you wake up in the morning and nothing seems to go your way, tell yourself that everything you're going through whether big or small, is in some shape or form making you stronger. The fight you got in with your parents, spouse, and/or sibling when you spoke before you thought? Well that just taught you to be quicker to hear, slower to speak, and slower to anger (James 1:19). The test you spent hours studying for might have just given you an "A". The girls at school who you think look way prettier than you taught you to rely on God more to realize that outward beauty is no match against inner beauty. All things, whether big or small, carry potential for you to rely on God and learn something from the situation. Put everything you go through together and what do you get? A girl (or guy) who is blossoming for the Lord. "A woman [or man] becomes a woman [or man] when she/he becomes what God wants her/him to be!" Point-blank: "The Lord is good to those who wait for Him" (Lamentations 3:25). Wait through that trial, whether it be as big as a death in the family or as small as a bad hair day. God is using it for your good and for his glory in the very moments you think your rose is starting to die. When you think you can't handle the bad weather any longer, a rainbow appears and blooming unfolds. God knows everything about you; your past, present, AND future. He loves you enough to give you the best, so just be patient to receive that happiness and sense of relief you have been longing for. James 1:2-4 says, "Dear brothers [and sisters], is your life full of difficulties and temptations? Then be happy, for when the way is rough, your patience has a chance to grow. So let it grow, and don't try to squirm out of your problems. For when your patience is finally in full bloom, then you will be ready for anything, strong in character, full and complete."