Recently I grew some tulips in a pot… it was a new venture into the world of bulbs. It of course involved selecting a good-sized pot, adding potting mix and placing the bulbs at the right depth. Then, wait for tulips come springtime.

Springtime is that season when flowers seem to appear out of nowhere and seemingly overnight… bulbs burst forth with their colourful displays. So, I waited for my chosen bulbs to emerge. Leaves appeared, then stem and bud… watering then became very important as the bulbs were now producing their flowers.

It was not long before I noticed a tinge of colour appearing in a bud. Ever slowly but surely, a red tulip began to open. Then we enjoyed watching a yellow and another red appear. But wait a minute, I definitely remember putting in four bulbs… I could see another stem, but the bud was small and not growing.

Our Christian lives can be likened to bulbs as our spiritual beginnings are established and develop in Christ but what about that one bulb that didn’t flower? Sure, it was in the pot like the other three, time passed, but its growth stopped. Similarly, we can live life as a Christian but fail to fully develop.

God is in the business of growing us. He wants us to keep developing in Christ and to see us changing… like the tulip, perfected in shape and colour.

Ref. Romans 12:2, 2 Peter3:18 NIV.