I am not a professional rose gardener by any stretch of the imagination, but I enjoy growing roses, and have learned lessons and found symbolisms from rose gardening:
Variety
Did you know there are more than 100 wild species of roses and thousands of rose hybrids developed for gardening based on bloom shape, size, fragrance and even lack of thorns? Sometimes people feel that they “don’t fit in” at school, work or church because they aren’t like the popular people, or they waste time trying to be like everyone else. Think of how boring it would be if every rose in a garden was identical. Even the most beautiful rose, if it was identical to every other rose, would be boring and redundant. I prefer the beauty of a rose garden that has roses of many different colors, shapes and sizes. I celebrate that God made us unique and not exactly the same as everyone else.
Thorns
Not long ago I was planting roses with my oldest daughter, when she asked, “Daddy, why do we plant roses if they have thorns?” That profound comment caused me to think. Every rose has its thorns; just like each of us have our mistakes or imperfections. Each time we give someone a rose, it is a combination of a beautiful blossom, and a stem with thorns. The same is true of our relationships. I’ve heard it said that every marriage has 10 irreconcilable differences. Sometimes people get divorced because of these differences, and enter another marriage with a different set of 10 irreconcilable differences. Nobody is going to be perfect. In the same way we can overlook the thorns on a beautiful rose, we need to become better at focusing on the beauty in each person and be better at overlooking their imperfections.
Outward Appearance
Twentieth-century rose breeders generally emphasized size and color, producing large, attractive blooms with little or no scent. Many wild and “old-fashioned” roses, by contrast, have a strong, sweet scent. When I have to choose, do I choose to focus on the outward appearance so that I can look good to the world, or do I prioritize the inward things that cannot be seen but truly matter?
Law of the Harvest
If I plant a cactus, I’m not going to get a rose. If I want roses to grow in my garden, I need to plant roses. The same is true in my life. If I want good things to happen, I need to plant the seeds of goodness .
Matthew 7:16 - “Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?”
Nitrogen is an essential part of amino acids and nucleic acids, both of which are essential to all life. Without nitrogen, roses languish and die. Nitrogen is the largest single component of the Earth’s atmosphere (78.082% by volume of dry air). Literally tons of nitrogen are directly above a single rose bush struggling for this basic nutrient to survive, but roses do not have the ability to capture nitrogen from the atmosphere. This is a poignant example of “so close but so far.” How often in life are we so close yet so far from the spirituality which we really need to thrive and grow? Do we focus on the things of the world and make ourselves unable to receive spiritual nourishment?
Roots
My neighbors have a rose bush that is very wide and more than 6 feet tall. The newest rose bushes I just planted are less than a foot tall with just a few stems. The biggest difference is the root structure. My neighbor’s roses has had years to build a large, stable root structure, so that even if it is cut back, it can still quickly grow a large and beautiful rose bush. Just like rose bushes, spiritual roots don’t grow overnight. Spiritual roots come from years of faithful church attendance and participation, striving to keep the commandments, daily scripture reading, fasting and prayer, and lifelong service.
Photosynthesis
Each rose is a compact chemical-processing factory. Using sunlight, the green leaves take carbon dioxide from the air and replace it with oxygen, which we breathe. When other chemicals within the plant react with sunlight, it produces starch that becomes the plant biomass (roots, stems, leaves, and rose blossoms). This process is called photosynthesis, and without it the earth’s atmosphere would soon be devoid of oxygen, and most living things would disappear from the earth.
Rose rust is one of the most serious diseases to which roses are susceptible. Rust fungus that can defoliate the rose and make it unable to receive light. Rose rust can occur in many different ways in our lives, making us unable to receive light, such as pornography, and inappropriate music, television, and movies.
Climate
Roses thrive in temperate climates. One year I bought some roses from Sam’s Club, but waited nearly 2 weeks to plant them. Because they sat for weeks in an Arizona summer before being planted, nearly all of those roses died.
When Gordon B. Hinckley was young, he and his wife danced to a song with the following words:
Is love like a rose
That blossoms and grows,
Then withers and goes
When summer is gone?
This same question has been asked for centuries by men and women who love each other and want to know if that love can continue after this life. President Hinckley responded to that question:
“We…reaffirm that love and marriage under the revealed plan of the Lord are not like the rose that withers with the passing of summer. Rather, they are eternal, as surely as the God of heaven is eternal. But this gift, precious beyond all others, comes only with a price—with self-discipline, with virtue, with obedience to the commandments of God. These may be difficult, but they are possible under the motivation that comes of an understanding of truth.”
Law of Abundance
In Christ’s first recorded miracle where he turned water into wine at the request of his mother, Christ made sufficiently more wine than was necessary. In the miracle of the loaves and fishes, more loaves and fish remained after all were fed than when he began. Why did the Lord make more wine, bread and fish that were necessary in these miracles? Did he miscalculate? Or, was the abundance part of the lesson he taught through the miracle?
Modern rose hybrids have a complex genetic background that almost always includes China roses. China roses were evergrowing, everblooming roses from humid subtropical regions that bloomed constantly during the growing season. Modern hybrids bloom continuously (until stopped by frost) on any new canes produced during the growing season. They therefore require pruning away of any spent flowering stem, in order to divert the plant’s energy into producing new growth and thence new flowers.
“Deadheading” is the simple practice of manually removing any spent, faded, withered or discolored flowers from rose shrubs over the course of the blooming season. This is done to promote rebloom, to keep shrubs looking tidy, and to eliminate stem dieback.
What would be examples of “spiritual deadheading” in our lives? As we give of ourselves through love and service, it doesn’t take anything away from us, but instead more love and goodness are abundantly replenished in our lives.
Ivy
In our first home we had 26 rose bushes. A very healthy and aggressive ivy vine grew near a few of these rose bushes. This vine grew up the rose bushes and grew leaves outside the leaves of the rose bushes, in competition for the light. I noticed when started growing on the first rose bush and I didn’t do anything about it.
More than a month later the ivy had begun to suffocate the rose bush. I then had a substantial project to remove the ivy which was then completely intertwined with the rose bush. This would have been a simple project if I would have done it when the ivy had first started to grow on the rose bush.
This ivy is like the entangling of sin. If we deal with sin immediately it is much easier and less painful to resolve. However, the longer we allow sin to grow and entangle itself in our lives without removing it, the harder and more painful it becomes, and the longer we allow it to block light from entering our lives.
Pruning
Roses need to regularly be pruned for a variety of reasons. This week we had to cut back three very healthy stems on our rose bushes which were growing well, but were growing in the wrong directions. Roses usually require a “hard” annual pruning to reach their full potential. This pruning requires cutting the stems back to 8″–12″ in height in early spring. Also, any weak, damaged or diseased growth should be pruned away completely, regardless of the time of year.
The Master Gardener in our lives regularly prunes us back and shapes us through trials, challenges and adversity. He knows this is the only way that we can achieve our full spiritual potential.
Positive or Negative
Did you know that you can change the PH of the soil and alter the colors of the rose blossoms? This can be done by increasing the PH with an “acid” such as lemon juice, or decreasing the PH with a “base” like milk.
A positive or negative outlook on life can drastically affect the nature of the blossoms in our lives.
Potential / Self Realization
Inside each rose is a giant storehouse of genetic coding that develops a seed or a slip into roots, stems, thorns, leaves, colors, and blooms. Each of us has a spiritual genetic blueprint of talent and potential with which God has endowed us. We are seeds with beautiful potential.
Conclusion
I am grateful for those who have been patient with me despite my thorns, and accepted me even though I am not the typical variety of rose. I’m grateful for good friends and family who have been there us during our regular prunings and planted an abundance of kindness in our lives.
(Sources: Portions of this article came from the Wikipedia rose article and talks from LDS.org.)
Posted on April 21st, 2008 by admin
Filed under: Faith, Life Lessons, Self Improvement
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