Acceptance-With-Joy

There it was. A tiny tree. Embedded in rock and cement, it defied the laws of nature and continued to grow. I came across it growing out of my front porch today. I tried to pull it out, but it was firmly planted in the rock. And I thought of one of my all-time favorite books, an allegory titled Hinds Feet on High Places.

I identify with the main character, Much-Afraid, who embarked on a journey to the High Places to get closer to the Shepherd. Along the way, each character and place she encounters delivers impactful lessons. One that has always stayed with me was her meeting with a tiny flower growing in the harshest of places.

“In all that great desert, there was not a single green thing growing, neither tree nor flower nor plant save here and there a patch of straggly gray cacti, On the last morning {Much-Afraid} was walking near the tents and huts of the desert dwellers, when in a lonely corner behind a wall she came upon a little golden-yellow flower, growing all alone.

An old pipe was connected with a water tank. In the pipe was one tiny hole through which came an occasional drop of water. Where the drops fell one by one, there grew the little golden flower, though where the seed had come from, Much-Afraid could not imagine, for there were no birds anywhere and no other growing things.

She stopped over the lonely, lovely little golden face, lifted up so hopefully and so bravely to the feeble drip, and cried out softly, “What is your name, little flower, for I never saw one like you before.”

The tiny plant answered at once in a tone as golden as itself, “Behold me! My name is Acceptance-with-Joy!“

Much-Afraid thought of the things which she had seen… Somehow the answer of the little golden flower which grew all alone in the waste of the desert stole into her heart and echoed there faintly and sweetly, filling her with comfort. She said to herself, “He (the Shepherd) has brought me here when I did not want to come, for His own purpose. I, too, will look up into His face and say, ‘Behold me! I am your little handmaiden, Acceptance-with-Joy.’”

Later, the Shepherd tells Much-Afraid, “When you wear the weed of impatience in your heart instead of the flower Acceptance-with-Joy, you will always find your enemies get an advantage over you.” 

I often think of Acceptance-with-Joy when I’m facing hardships that seem to destroy me, when I’m in the dryest of spells, parched and longing for Living Water. That little flower helps me to live out the words of James,

“Count it all joy…when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”

I don’t FEEL joy until I make the deliberate effort to COUNT it all joy. Joy is a choice. Knowing that the trials have a purpose – to produce steadfastness, perfection, completion – gives me the strength to count them as joy, and to say to my Shepherd, “I am your handmaiden, Acceptance-with-Joy.” 

www.susanpanzica.com

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