Symbols

A prominent figure in Buddhist and Egyptian culture, and native flower for both India and Vietnam, the Lotus holds enormous symbolic weight. It spans various thousand-year-old Eastern cultures and yet, is still considered one of the most sacred flowers today.

So what is it about this mysterious blossom that people find so enrapturing? Its colorful bloom is an obvious suspect, but the lotus also has a life cycle unlike any other. With its roots based in mud, it submerges every night into murky river water, and—undeterred by its dirty environment—it miraculously re-blooms the next morning without residue on its petals.

Although cultures have their own interpretations of this daily process, there is a general consensus among ancient texts that it symbolizes spiritual enlightenment and rebirth. The lotus stunned people with its ability to dip into the grime and revive itself unscathed—an incredible daily cycle of life, death, and a sudden immaculate rebirth that can only be described as "spiritual."

Well, that is some of the history behind this beautiful plant, and just in case you were wondering, my faith is in God alone and I trust in the crucified and resurrected work of Jesus Christ, His Son. There is no flower on this planet that can symbolize my faith, but an old wooden cross and an empty tomb certainly can! I cannot by works or power cleanse myself, revive myself or experience a rebirth apart from the sacrifice offered on Calvary for the salvation of humanity.

My life was once rooted firmly in the muck and mire of sin before Christ intervened and changed me, but now I am rooted securely in His love and cleansed completely by His forgiveness. It was His death, burial and resurrection that gives me life everlasting and fills me immeasurably with the fullness of God. My prayer for you is that same found below from the Apostle Paul to the church in Ephesus.

Ephesians 3:16-19
I pray that out of [God's] glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

The background of the Lotus plant was found at https://www.townandcountrymag.com/leisure/arts-and-culture/a9550430/lotus-flower-meaning/