Jun22024
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Perennials Versus Annuals.

I ran the Boston Marathon in a pair of shoes called the Alphafly 1. I wanted to run in the Alphafly 3. Here is why I did not. The Alphafly 3 went on sale two weeks before the marathon at 10:00 am on a Thursday. I had to teach a class at that time.  When I returned home around noon, I went online to order my pair but they were sold out. They sold out in five minutes. What? Doesn’t anybody work anymore? My question is, why did the manufacturer not produce enough to go around? The reason is marketing. They wanted to create demand. When something is in big demand, the value goes up.
Fenway Park has 33,000 seats. It is the smallest ballpark in the country, and they want to keep it that way for good reasons. When the Red Sox are playing great ball, you cannot get a ticket. They are sold out. The high demand makes the ticket prices go up.

When God sent His Son into the world as the Bread of Life, He created a demand for something great. Allow me to illustrate.

 Perennials versus Annuals. I used to be an annuals guy. Annuals are great because they flower all summer. The problem is that they die at the end of the season. You have to go to the nursery the next season and buy more flowers, which is, of course, involves lot of time and money. So, I switched to perennials. They come up every year, and they fill out the garden nicely. The problem with perennials is they only flower for two weeks. You will never see a tulip at the end of August. So, if you want a perennial flower garden, you have to have a lot of different plants that flower at different times. In the early spring, I had my tulips and daffodils. When they begin to fade, the magnolia tree blossoms. After that comes the hydrangeas. Once they decline, the hosta and roses take over, followed by the day lilies and Easter lilies.

I mention this because the Bible often compares humans to a beautiful flower. Like them, our glory is fleeting and temporary. We are all annuals, or the flower that shines for two weeks and then withers. We briefly make an impact in life, and then we fade. When God sent His Son as the Bread of Life, we went from an annual to a perennial that flowers all the time. Imagine eating juicy garden tomatoes all year, not just at the end of August. Let’s say you go to the store; on one shelf, you find annuals that will need to be replaced in the next season; on another, you have a perennial that flowers year-round. What would you buy? You had better act fast because those kinds of perennials will be in high demand. You cannot delay as I did with the alphafly 3. People may ask us why we still go to Church to gather around the table for the Bread of Life. The answer is simple. Just remember annuals versus perennials, and you will have a great place in the divine garden.  

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