Poppy Resurrection

I was walking through the neighborhood today glancing at the backdrop that the vacant lots and abandoned homes provide when something caught my eye. I made my way over to a vacant lot to witness these unbelievable flowers that had bloomed right in the empty lot. Anyone with a knowledge of flowers or gardens would know that it was a poppy flower (I had no idea). I was taken aback by its bright color redish orange color, large size, paper mache like pedals, and its location, a vacant lot, that most would say was a waste of space that was hopeless.

After a little research on the flower I found out that in Greco-Roman culture it symbolized eternal sleep and is often used as a symbol on tombstones. I thought about that for a little bit: The vacant lot has a lot in common with that flower, it seemed to be trapped in an eternal sleep that despite the efforts of many different forces it could not come out of its eternal sleep in other words was dead. These lots are not meant to be vacant, they are designed to have a house full of energy, laughs, tears, and every aspect of life living and breathing on top of it. Yet these empty lots our trapped in this eternal sleep without the life it desires to take root in its soil.
There is hope though. See when I saw in that flower I saw potential, opportunity, transformation, and ultimately resurrection in the midst of despair. The Greco-Roman culture also used the poppy flower as a symbol of resurrection.

We pass by these lots so quickly and without any hope that they never are able to become more than the wasteful space trapped in an eternal sleep waiting and desiring someone to build and resurrect it. We forget that if resurrected they have the potential to sprout beautiful poppy flowers or a beautiful home where a family is given a second chance, a place to laugh, love, cry, cook, and invite neighbors into.

Jesus' resurrection didn't end with his ascension to heaven and is not just to be celebrated around spring holidays but is the continuos workings of God transforming the messes we make out of the world into beauty.