Albert Einstein once counseled a discontented fellow scientist to “bloom where you’re planted.” Like the cows who stretch for the greener grass on the other side of the fence, some people are always lamenting if only they were somewhere else they could do so much more.
We should never think we are of no use where we are. We are certainly of no use where we are not. We all need to “bloom where we’re planted.” We need to do what we can with what we have right where we are.
God knows where we are. He is aware of when we sit down and when we rise up and He is acquainted with all our ways. Blades of grass come up and grow through the tiniest cracks in cement. They have a choice of growing there or not at all. Let us not put off doing good until we are somewhere else. Do good right here and right now. The good we do here will prepare us for the good we may be able to do somewhere else at some other time. Let us not be guilty of doing nothing, because we are waiting to do something sometime in the future when we are somewhere else.
It is a worthy goal to desire to go into the mission field. Those with this lofty ambition, however, should begin at once to preach on the street where they live. There are many people perishing for lack of knowledge right in our own home town. Begin where we are.
In the parable of “the good Samaritan” Jesus taught us that our neighbor is the one in need of our services right where we are. The one who needs our helping hand is the one at hand. We do not need to look far to find a work to do; it is right in our own back yard. Solomon told us that “whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might.”
To grow where we are is to blossom, for as Isaiah said concerning his people, they “shall blossom and bud, and fill the face of the world with fruit.”
Jesus asked the question, “Can the fig tree, my brethren, bear olive berries? either a vine, figs?” We cannot grow what we are not, nor can we bloom anywhere but where we are.
Let us be thankful that we can bear fruit for the Lord, and let us get busy blooming and growing where we are. Jesus has told us, “He that soweth the good seed is the Son of man; the field is the world; the good seed are the children of the kingdom.” He has placed us where we are. We need to be content and bloom where we are planted, to grow where we are, to bring forth fruit to His name’s honor and glory.
Jesus has told us, “Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire.”
We are known by our fruit or the lack of it. Jesus cursed a fig tree that had no fruit. At his coming will he find that we have been blossoming and growing fruit? Or do we think we should be somewhere else, and refuse to bloom because we are discontented with our position and place in life? Let us accept where we are. Paul told us that he had to learn to be content in whatsoever state he was in, even in prison. He certainly did not want to be there, but he bloomed in prison and brought forth fruit in jail. We have his prison letters today because he bloomed where he was planted in that Roman cell.
Our Lord knows where we are and we can take comfort in remembering that he said to us, “Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you.”
The Origin of the Organic World – Part One