Sabbath Rest

(Youngest son explores at a bed and breakfast ranch in French Lick, Indiana.)

Psalm 83:1-3 Keep not thou silence, O God: hold not thy peace, and be not still, O God.
For, lo, thine enemies make a tumult: and they that hate thee have lifted up the head.
They have taken crafty counsel against thy people, and consulted against thy hidden ones.

What is hidden in your garden?

Thy Hidden Ones

Thick, green leaves from the soft brown earth,


Happy springtime has called them forth;


First faint promise of summer bloom


Breathes from the fragrant, sweet perfume,


Under the leaves.





Lift them! What marvelous beauty lies


Hidden beneath, from our thoughtless eyes!


Mayflowers, rosy or purest white,


Lift their cups to the sudden light,


Under the leaves.





Are there no lives whose holy deeds--


Seen by no eye save His who reads


Motive and action--in silence grow


Into rare beauty, and bud and blow


Under the leaves?





Fair white flowers of faith and trust,


Springing from spirits bruised and crushed;


Blossoms of love, rose-tinted and bright,


Touched and painted with Heaven's own light


Under the leaves.





Full fresh clusters of duty borne,


Fairest of all in that shadow grown;


Wondrous the fragrance that sweet and rare


Comes from the flower-cups hidden there


Under the leaves.





Though unseen by our vision dim,


Bud and blossom are known to Him;


Wait we content for His heavenly ray--


Wait till our Master Himself one day


Lifts up the leaves.

--from Streams in the Desert

As for me, the suburbanite who rarely sees such "may flowers" in my daily landscape, I look instead for the flowers I don't naturally notice, despite their being everywhere. Many are "hidden" from my desensitized eyes, and I'm often surprised how many of them I find when I really look for them.