Strawberry Flowers

No-one picks strawberry flowers. I have never seen them in a vase nor in spray. It is not that they are not pretty in a simple, naïve kind of way, but because the flowers become the fruit. Whatever pleasure that pale bloom bestows is much surpassed by the red, juicy fruit which a few week’s patience may then harvest, and the lips and taste buds may savour.

Isaiah in 40:8 speaks of the fading of flowers:

“The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God stands forever.”

While John, in 4:36, speaks of the gathering of fruit:

And he who reaps receives wages, and gathers fruit for eternal life, that both he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together.

The pleasures of this world are pretty though fleeting, but we wait for something better, and longer lasting.