amaryllis

High school was when I first developed my love for amaryllis bulbs.

I penned the song “My name is Amaryllis and I am a bulb.” The tune was simple, and I still sing it.

This morning I was preparing for the best weekend of the year (Good Friday through Easter Morn). I was rummaging through the pantry, looking for a place to let something dry where a toddler couldn’t see it when I discovered an amaryllis bulb on the top shelf of the pantry. I had carefully left it there, on its side, in the dark, last year.

If you do that with these bulbs, they grow again each year and sprout fabulously large, stunning, bright flowers that remind us that yes, God loves beauty way more than we do. This stunning plant changes your home for a few weeks each year.

Amaryllis’ only shoot up one stalk every year. From that stalk comes several large flowers.

But the bulb was not in good sorts of any kind.

The bulb had already started to sprout this large stalk. I had forgotten about it, and, on time, it was crying out for sunlight, food, and water. And the worst part about it (besides it’s curved pale stalk from lack of light) was that in the process of its growth, it was cutting its stalk on a sharp edge in the pantry.

I rushed and cut holes in the bottom of our Trader Joes animal crackers’ plastic tub, filled it with dirt, mashed in some water, and found a spot in the house with sunlight. So there it sits, with a gaping hole in its lifeblood, on our chest freezer.

I actually cried.

If it blooms, I’ll post a picture.

This is Easter week- the best week of the year, and I’ve only begun preparing my heart since last night. I have been so forgetful- both with my amaryllis and much more with preparing to remember Christ’s sacrifice. God has this riveting beauty about him that can change our homes forever. I’ve just been letting it sit in a dark room.

This certainly isn’t the first year that I’ve found myself so irresponsible with God.
Praise God for His grace. May you remember Him.

Abby