Seeds of Hope
Now the parable is this: The seed is the word of God. ~ LUKE 8:11 (ESV)Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the
reason for the hope that you have. ~ 1 PETER 3:15 (NIV)
On the day of his 10th birthday, a young boy received three gifts from his grandmother: a pot filled with dirt, a pail of water, and an acorn. When he saw what she had given him, disappointment crossed his face. Seeing his reaction, his grandmother chuckled and took the acorn in her hand. The young boy watched as she buried it in the soil and placed the pot on a windowsill.
“Soon we’ll have to replant it outside,” she told him. “And in a few years it’ll be a beautiful tree — big enough to climb!” His grandmother poured some water into the pot and gave him a wink.
The boy stared at the dirt, but he couldn’t imagine how something so invisible could become what she had promised. He stole occasional glances at the pot on the windowsill the next day, but the dirt remained flat and empty. Time passed, and he eventually forgot about the acorn hiding in the soil.
A month later, the boy’s grandmother came to visit and asked him about the acorn. When his eyes shifted to the forgotten pot, he was shocked to see a sapling poking out of the dirt. Together, he and his grandmother replanted the young tree in its own corner of the yard.
The years passed, and the tree’s branches thickened into strong limbs. Its leaves stretched higher and higher toward the blue sky, and the boy eagerly climbed it until he too was touching the clouds. It was everything his grandmother had promised.
As the boy grew older, he recalled how doubtful he had been that the small acorn would ever become a tree. When he asked his grandmother how she knew it would grow the way she had imagined, there was a glimmer in her eyes as she gave her response.
“I had hope.”
Dear God: let us plant your Word in our lives and have hope that we will grow as strong, beautiful, and fruitful Christians — just as you have promised.
RACHAEL KELLEY, TRINITY UNITED METHODIST CHURCH