My Morning Glory

On my way to MacPherson Secondary School this morning, where i am currently serving my latest tour of invigilation duty, a magnificent sight greeted me.

You see, i usually alight at the bus stop behind the school field. i then proceed to cut across a small patch of grass, lying twenty metres to the side of the main school gate, on a well-worn path, where the grass is threadbare at best.

Is it this field that enraptured me this morning, you might be asking right now?

Surely, it must be a veritable field of gold to stir the gentle disposition of so sensitive a young man as Mr Joshua Sng, your mind might have added, a moment later.

Well, it’s not a field of gold.

Firstly, it hardly qualifies as a field, being as it is, as i first mentioned, a patch of grass, and a miserable looking one at that. Which patch of grass wouldn’t be, if it had copious amounts of rubbish strewn across its delicate countenance, and a few rather unsightly, tough-looking construction vehicles, which have no doubt seen better days, resting upon it? i mean, it’s enough to make any self-respecting patch of grass sick and turn yellow, which much to the aforementioned patch of grass’ credit, it did not.

Secondly, there was no gold to be found. Not unless you regard the golden sunshine that fell upon it this morning as worth its weight in the real stuff.

Highly unlikely, i would think. This is Singapore, we’re talking about here. Pragmatic, old bird that she is. None of that i-think-i-shall-never-see-a-poem-as-lovely-as-a-tree malarkey. Fluff. That’s what it is. Awful, inedible, financially unviable fluff. Bah humbug!

At least, that’s how I’d expect her to put it.

Anyway, back to the point i wanted to get at. That’s right.

It was a magnificent sight that greeted me this morning, as i cut across this patch of grass.

Why so?

For the moment i stepped onto its usually plaintive surface, my eyes were filled with the sight of bloom upon bloom of morning glories (not sure if it works in the plural, but never mind…).

A pre-eminent patch of palpable purple pleasure.

Perfect!

This was notable for the simple reason that on my past two jaunts through this patch of grass, it looked miserable, as it rightly should, and gave no indication of the beauty that was hid beneath its repulsive scowl, and that was to burst forth in such glorious (pardon the pun) manner this morning.

It was such a timely reminder from the Lord, especially after the dismal events of the past two months that was my relationship with him, of the potential for beauty, for glory, that lies beneath even the ugliest surface.

However, more truth was to surface.

My mind flipped (metaphorically, of course) immediately to these verses in Isaiah 40: 6-8

A voice says, “Cry!”
And I said, “What shall I cry?”
All flesh is grass,
and all it’s beauty is like the flower of the field.
The grass withers, the flower fades
when the breath of the LORD blows on it;
surely the people are grass.
The grass withers, the flower fades,
but the word of our God will stand forever.

Beauty in this world, no matter how wondrous and enrapturing, is passing.

The fairest flower in the field will wither and die.

The softest, most supple skin will wrinkle and turn to dust.

The happiest moments of our lives are soon past, living only as flickering embers in our hearts.

Everything in this world is ephemeral.

Thus, the word which leaps out at us from the verses above is the word forever.

Eternity.

Immortality.

Elusive eternity. Impossible immortality.

Yet one thing is forever – the word of God.

And if even his word is forever, eternal and everlasting, what more the person from which the word proceeds? How much more, perhaps, is the appropriate question.

So if you were to read the verses in the context of the entire chapter – the call made in Isaiah 40 is not just one of the remembrance of the eternal word of God, but of the Eternal One himself – Yahweh, the everlasting God.

The Only God.

Why do i marvel at this?

Why did my heart leap as the host of morning glories was presented before my eyes?

Ensconced in the mire of self and the despair that dwelling in this painfully-temporal world produces, i had forgotten to look to the One, who makes sense of everything, who is the sole reason for living, who is everything in this nothing, infinity in this finiteness.

And thus, his invincible word pierced the stubborn defences of my heart, reminding me once more of His truth:

Have you not known? Have you not heard?
The LORD is the everlasting God,
the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He does not grow faint or weary;
his understanding is unsearchable.
He gives power to the faint,
and to him who has no might he increases strength.
Even youths shall faint and be weary,
and young men shall fall exhausted;
but they who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength;
they shall mount up with wings like eagles;
they shall run and not be weary;
they shall walk and not faint.

Amen!

And Hallelujah!