Photo Essay: Look at the Wildflowers

This photo essay is a response to the current crisis and the wonder spoken to in Matthew 6. In each photo, you’ll find a flower or a collection of flowers that speaks to God’s care, provision, and ongoing restoration work in my life.

The flowers pictured here are from:

a bouquet given to me by clients when I was their travel agent in 2018;
a birthday bouquet given to me by my friend this year;
nearby fields, handpicked for me by my mum this Easter;
a walk around my neighbourhood;
and a memorial service for my friend’s daughter who they lost at 6 months in the womb.

Please take your time through each photo and follow Jesus’s words from Matthew 6, taken from The Message version.

Hover your cursor over the image, or if viewing on mobile, press the image to read the Scripture.

If you decide for God, living a life of God-worship, it follows that you don’t fuss about what’s on the table at mealtimes or whether the clothes in your closet are in fashion.

There is far more to your life than the food you put in your stomach, more to your outer appearance than the clothes you hang on your body.

Look at the birds, free and unfettered, not tied down to a job description, careless in the care of God.

And you count far more to him than birds.

Has anyone by fussing in front of the mirror ever gotten taller by so much as an inch?

All this time and money wasted on fashion—do you think it makes that much difference?

Instead of looking at the fashions, walk out into the fields and look at the wildflowers.

They never primp or shop, but have you ever seen colour and design quite like it?

The ten best-dressed men and women in the country look shabby alongside them.

If God gives such attention to the appearance of wildflowers—most of which are never even seen…

…don’t you think he’ll attend to you, take pride in you, do his best for you?

What I’m trying to do here is to get you to relax, to not be so preoccupied with getting, so you can respond to God’s giving.

People who don’t know God and the way he works fuss over these things, but you know both God and how he works.

Steep your life in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions.

Don’t worry about missing out. You’ll find all your everyday human concerns will be met.

Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now…

…and don’t get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow.

God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes.