Religious Life

Southland Times, Issue 24472, 27 June 1941, Page 8

Religious Life

By

ICHTHUS

Don’t Forget The Chrysanthemums Today I received a most pointed, proper and deserved rebuke. 1 had been over the farm in the winter weather, and came grumblingly in to lunch. “What a dreary time winter is,” I growled. “This morning the skies were grey, and the earth drear. I have never seen the place look so dull and uninteresting. I have been out for four and e half hours, and there was never a bird, nor a flower blooming, nor one single bright spot.” At that the woman God gave me looked at me with a twinkle in her eye. “My good man,” quoth she, taking me by the arm, “just come with me.” She led me to the dining-room. Over the fireplace, on the mantelpiece, were several vases of glorious bronze chrysanthemums. “There,” she said, “take your fill of those. A drear, greyworld, indeed. It is not the world that is grey and drear, my man, it is you yourself. Wake up, and thank God for the chrysanthemums!” It was a bit of a shock. I almost felt my mind turn over as the truth of her words came home to me. She was entirely right. The chrysanthemums have been a miracle this winter. But I had forgotten them. “Margaret,” I said, “I am a gloomy ass, and you are an angel; I forgot the chrysanthemums. Also, I forgot you, and the children, and our home. Really, it is a pretty good old world after all, isn’t it. “The world is always alright, John,” she replied, “so long as we don’t forget the chrysanthemums.” It was all well worth while, for I have learned today two lessons which I shah not forget, and which make me a richer and a happier man. I have learned that there are chrysanthemums in winter, and that a wise man learns to look for them. there are chrysanthemums IN WINTER Margaret was very right, as mostly she is. I suppose it was the changed mental outlook in me that made the afternoon today so different. For the world outside did not change. The grey clouds remained, and the wintry aspect did not alter. But a number of surprising and heartening incidents followed one another as the day wore on. First, while loading the wheel-barrow with wood for our evening fire, I was startled by a swift whirr of wings jusever my head. Looking up quickly I saw that it was a tui. He had flown within a yard of me, and alighted on a nearby tree, where I had a close-up view of him. He was a thing of beauty and a joy forever. He perched there in his lovely, glossy plumage watching me with an eye that was full of life and pert inquiry. I think I never saw a more beautiful bird He was m fine condition in spite of the wintei xVeathei and the scarcity of his natural food. His feathers of black and blue and white were of glossy brightness, and the bunch of white at his throat was a thing to wonder at. Then his throat throbbed as he burst into song. Out on that wintry air burst those notes of purest melody that surely are surpassed in the richness and sweet ?® ss 4 their music by no bird song in the W °i rl siniled to myself as I remembered my morning depression. I must tell Margaret tonight that there are noty chrysanthemums in winter, but beauty and music too. Later on, I paused 01 a minute by a hawthorn hedge. I had passed it in the morning with unseeing eyes. But there it was. True, it was bare of leaves, and all the twigs were showing. But it was literally weighed down with such a load of the brightest, roundest crimson berries as I thouglit I had never seen before. Beauty again—and beyond the beauty something more than a hint of the thoughtful and loving Providence that spreads a table for the birds against the wild w m ter weather. Once more I thought of Margaret, and took, a mental note that I must tell her tonight that there are not only chrysanthemums in winter, and bird beauty and music; there is also Providence. Coming home, the last incident occurred. Passing a grove of oaks, I observed the ground beneath carpeted with last autumn’s fallen leaves, brown and dead. The bare trees and the carpet of leaves wore a lifeless aspect. A thought struck me, and, stooping, I brushed aside the leaves. Beneath them, warm and protected as by a blanket, I found the acorns. There were thousands of them, each one with its nose pointed to the ground. When I picked some up and examined them, I found that from the top end of each one a whitish shoot was growing and thrusting itself into the earth. Some early ones were even more advanced, and the development of a root system beneath, and the beginnings of a trunk and branch system above, could be clearly discerned. “Oh, Margaret, Margaret,” I said to myself, “there is no deadness at all. In the depth of winter spring with its new life is already here."

LOOKING FOR THE CHRYSANTHEMUMS

The second lesson I learned is that it is possible to live and walk in the very presence of these wonders and never see them at all. Margaret was quite right: the fault was not in the good world, but in me. The chrysanthemums, the tui with its beauty and music, the crimson hawthorns Providence had prepared, and the acorns springing beneath the leaves—they had been there that morning. They did not come suddenly into being in the afternoon. They were there to be seen. But I did not see them. I was dull and depressed, and I saw only dullness and depression. We must learn to look for the chrysanthemums. Then we shall see them, for they are there. And all the more that it is winter, and there is greyness and dreariness about in plenty, let us look for the bright flowers, and listen for the birds’ music, and train our eyes and hearts to see God’s good and loving preparations for the welfare of his creatures. In the darkest days there is so much left to be thankful for. Winter is over the world —the winter war brings. But goodness has not ceased in the earth. God is not dead. There are still chrysanthemums, there is beauty, music, providence, life. There is still love, and there is still hope. Let us not even unconsciously become concentrated on the dreariness. Don’t forget the chrysanthemums.