On my walk in the woods one morning, I saw a bright orange mushroom shaped like a tiny ballistic missal emerging from the ground. I took a picture. The next morning, I saw the same mushroom only it had opened into full flower – an amazing transformation from one morning to the next.
Mushrooms grow in composting earth, nice words for what some might call rotten waste. Mushrooms love it, but it is certainly not the environment we would usually choose for growth. Instead of bemoaning its surroundings, evolution taught the mushroom spore to find a way to tap into the rich nutrients of its surroundings, grow and bloom.
Sometimes our place in the world is none too pleasant. Circumstances have swept us away from what was comfortable, predictable and ‘normal’. Personally, before COVID, my talents and gifts were lining up nicely in my new career as a director of a retreat center. All of the pieces were coming together for a bright future filled with engaging and transformational retreats offered by a wide diversity of groups.
Because of all of the precautions and restrictions, instead of new bookings, I’m fielding cancellations. Instead of meeting people who might want to use the retreat center, I’m doing landscaping, painting and carpentry.
For a while, I resisted moving forward in this world. It is not my world. My surroundings are filled with a lot of unpleasant realities. I don’t want to wade through the compost. I don’t want to be surrounded by decay. But that is exactly where God has placed me at this point in time.
The prophets were often asked to ‘bloom’ in some of the most undesirable locations. I think of Jonah, who did not at all want to go to Ninevah and preach repentance to a hostile and corrupt nation. Being a slow learner, it took being cast overboard and swallowed by a big fish before he realized his life would be miserable until he goes to the place where he didn’t want to go and say the words he did not want to say to a people who did not want to listen. He ultimately did as the Lord instructed and the nation was converted and healed.
Isaiah replies to God’s call: “Woe is me… I am living among a people of unclean lips.” (Is 6) Even so, it was to these people that Isaiah became one of the most influential and literary prophets of the Old Testament.
The prophets found a way to get God’s message out in spite of their undesirable environment, or perhaps it was precisely this undesirable environment that made their message so effective.
I’ve opted to do the same. The large retreats have cancelled, but we’ve gotten better at hosting some smaller retreats, even private and individual retreats. The in-person networking has ceased but our email, web and social media platforms have expanded. We’ve tried more unique events in the last three months than the retreat center has in the last 30 years.
Even if this new Covid landscape seems at first unpleasant and unwelcome, I can still look for ways to tap into the nutrients laying beneath the surface, still look for opportunities for growth, still bloom in ways that I had not previously imagined.
How is God asking you to bloom where you’re planted?
Beautiful reflections! We all need to focus on our answer!