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If you want to be inspired, just google “plants that grow in concrete” and you will see amazing pictures of all kinds of flowers and plants that are able to grow in the most difficult, unlikely places. I was totally mesmerized to see lovely flowers growing out of cracks in a sidewalk, beautiful blooms popping up from a pile of old tires—picture after picture of plants that bloomed in the most unlikely and difficult places. That’s what I’m talking about—the challenge each of us faces to make the very best of where we are, blooming where we are planted.
Have you ever had the run-away blues? The run-away blues are those days, those times in your life when you’d just love to run away. When the thought of going to the airport and catching the next flight out to anywhere else, rather than where you are, sounds like a really good idea. Run-away blues—who hasn’t had those days?
David expressed it so well in Psalm 55. He was in a bad place then; his enemies were threatening him, his mind was a jumbled mess, his heart was in anguish and he was frightened. Now mind you, that was the condition of King David, a man after God’s own heart, who was chosen by God to be the King of Israel. I mean, come on, David, why would you want to run-away? But listen to what he wrote:
“Oh, that I had the wings of a dove! I would fly away and be at rest. I would flee far away and stay in the desert; I would hurry to my place of shelter, far from the tempest and storm” (Psalm 55:6-8).
David was doing what he was supposed to do, as God’s appointed king, and yet he longed to fly away and be at rest. Are you right now where David was then? Well, aren’t you glad he was inspired by God to put his feelings in writing and leave them for you today? It says that you aren’t condemned for feeling like you want to run away. Even kings have those times. But you have a God who cares and who can bring release and relief for you, right there where you are.
After expressing his run-away desires and fears to God, David then says:
As for me, I call to God, and the Lord saves me. Evening, morning and noon I cry out in distress, and he hears my voice. . . Cast your cares on the Lord and he will sustain you; he will never let the righteous be shaken (Psalm 55: 16, 22).
I wanted to remind you of these words of hope, from a king who wanted to fly away from where God had planted him. Even in the midst of doing what God has called you to do, you can lose your bloom and the enemy can steal your joy. If that’s where you are, just call to God—cry out to him. Cast your cares on the Lord, and he will put a new bloom inside you, and your desert will become a garden where you’re blooming again and the joy of the Lord will again be your strength.
There’s a passage in Jeremiah that is a great example of what it means to “bloom where you are planted.” You’ll find it in Jeremiah 29, and it is a letter that the prophet wrote to the people whom Nebuchadnezzar had carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon. Get the picture? They are God’s chosen people, now refugees who have been forcibly relocated in Babylon. This was a foreign culture; there was no temple in Babylon; it was a pagan culture, worshipping many false gods.
They did not want to be in Babylon. This was not the way they had planned their lives. This went against everything they thought life would be. Surely God did not want them to be in Babylon! Surely this was the worst place in the world for these Israelites to have to live. And yet this is where they found themselves—this is where they were planted.
And here is what Jeremiah wrote to them:
This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says to all those I carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: “Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce. Marry and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, so that they too may have sons and daughters. Increase in number there; do not decrease. Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper” (Jeremiah 29:4-7).
I’m trying to image how I would have felt, living in exile in Babylon, against everything I ever wanted, and then hearing God’s prophet tell me this—to settle down and make a life in Babylon. To prosper and do good and contribute to the prosperity of Babylon! Really, God? Didn’t you mean to fight and somehow get back to Jerusalem, and then make a good life for ourselves? But Babylon? Really?
Notice that Jeremiah didn’t say that they should fight to get back to Jerusalem. He didn’t say they should just get by until God provided a way of escape. He said to make the very best of the situation they were in. He told them to bloom where they were planted.
Notice that God told them that he had carried them into exile, not Nebuchadnezzar. This must have been an amazing statement to them. Their God had brought them to this terrible land? Why would God plant them there? It was hostile to their way of life, to their beliefs, to their God. And yet God made it clear that they were to bloom right there in Babylon where they were planted.
I am reminded that we who are Christ-followers are called foreigners and exiles in this world. Peter writes that we should “live out our time as foreigners here in reverent fear” (1 Peter 1:17b). We are planted here, and while we’re here we should bloom for Jesus. The exiles in Babylon were to build houses, plant gardens marry, increase in number and seek peace and prosperity for the city of Babylon. They were to bloom in Babylon, of all places.
But in Psalm 137 we find this sad passage:
By the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept when we remembered Zion. There on the poplars we hung our harps, for there our captors asked us for songs, our tormentors demanded songs of joy; they said, “Sing us one of the songs of Zion!” How can we sing the songs of the Lord while in a foreign land? (Psalm 137: 1-3).
Doesn’t sound like they were blooming there in Babylon, does it? Their joy was gone; their song was dead; they had given up because they were in Babylon and not in Jerusalem. Notice that they had the opportunity to sing the songs of Zion, the songs of the Lord. Their tormentors—their enemies—asked them to sing their songs. They could have shared the truth about the true God with these pagan people, but their response was, “How can we sing the songs of the Lord while in a foreign land?”
Contrast their response to being where they didn’t want to be to Daniel’s. He was part of those who were taken as captives to Babylon. But Daniel decided to stay true to his God even in Babylon. The Bible says he “resolved not to defile himself with the royal food and wine.” In other words, he wasn’t going to compromise his standards or betray his God just because he was in a place he didn’t want to be—a place that was truly hostile to his God. So, he stood his ground, time and again, refusing to compromise his beliefs, but at the same time, blooming in that place. He did his job so well that he was quickly recognized for his contribution to the good of Babylon and given a high place of authority.
His coworkers there in Babylon grew very jealous of him and tried to destroy him. But try as hard as they could, the Bible says, “They could find no corruption in him, because he was trustworthy and neither corrupt nor negligent” (Daniel 6:4b). Daniel was obeying what the prophet Jeremiah had exhorted them to do—to bloom there in Babylon and seek the peace and prosperity of that city. He refused to hang his harp on a tree. He sang the songs of Zion, as it were, right there in Babylon. He prayed three times a day to his God, and everyone knew that Daniel worshiped the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the true God.
What an impact Daniel had in Babylon. What a testimony he was and how powerfully God was able to use him and demonstrate his power through Daniel. No doubt many in Babylon came to worship the true God because of Daniel—because he bloomed where he was planted.
Maybe you’re in some place today that you don’t want to be—a job you don’t like, a marriage that is troubling, an unknown future for some reason or another—or maybe you’re just bored or tired or totally unmotivated. Or could it be that you’ve been hurt; someone has offended you or wounded you in some way, so you’ve hung your harp on a poplar tree, so to speak, and quit blooming.
I’ve been there; I know how that feels, but I just want to encourage you today to remember that if you’re a child of God through faith in Jesus Christ, there is a beautiful bloom inside of you, planted there by our God, and it’s just waiting to break through and show the beauty of Christ in you. But you’ve got to open a little crack and let God’s sunshine in; you’ve got to nourish your soul and believe that all things will work together for your good because you love Jesus and you have been called according to his purpose. You’ve got to learn the secret of contentment, and then you can bloom right there in that hard place.
You know, anyone can bloom when everything’s going right and life is easy. When the sun is shining and the soil is good and you water it regularly, you can get most any kind of plant to grow. It’s easy! But blooming when you’re planted in hard soil, in a cold climate, in a tough place—that’s not so easy. However, when you bloom in a hard place, that’s when you really make a statement to the world around you—a statement that can’t be denied. Something’s different about you—you’re singing the songs of the Lord in a foreign land, and believe me, those songs will be heard by those nearby.
So, go get that harp you hung up on the poplar tree, and by faith—not necessarily by feelings—ask God to give you a song to sing right where you are, a song from the Lord even while you’re planted in that place you don’t want to be. You can turn your Babylon into a garden full of God’s love, knowing he loves you and sharing his love with everyone around you.