Mandy’s funeral was over.  She had been the servant of the family all her adult life.  They had been present at the funeral and in response to a request that he say a few words, her employer had praised her faithful and devoted service.  On the way home a friend had commented, “If Mandy had known what he thought of her, she probably would have gotten well.”

      Funeral eulogies usually come too late to water the roots of religion, fan the flames of friendship, and leaven life with love.  “Say it with flowers” is the language florists encourage us to speak.  Whatever motive we may attach to this encouragement we at least need to recognize the importance of waging a battle against the tendency of modern living “to widen acquaintances and narrow true friendships.”

The Secret of the Beautiful Life

      “What is the secret of your beautiful life? Tell me and I will make mine beautiful too!” Elizabeth Barrett Browning was questioning Charles Kingsley.  His answer was brief, “I had a friend.” Who, being honest with himself, would deny that whatever of beauty and nobility in his life came from a true friendship?  As we strengthen these friendship, we rise to a higher plane of living.

      Flowers help to do this for they express our thoughts.  The girl who gets flowers, or the patient in the hospital or the sorrowing friend at the funeral who receive them, has something which speaks of love and sympathy.  The world would be a dreary place without the beauty of flowers for the eyes, and encouragement for the heart, but there are other kinds of expressions which are in a very real sense flowers which add beauty to life and friendships.

Flowers in a Letter

      Paul’s letter to the Philippians is a fine specimen of “flowers for the living.” The Philippian Church was the first of several founded by Paul in the province of Macedonia.  This was the place to which he went in response to the vision at Troas, in which he heard a cry in the night and a man pleading, “Come over into Macedonia and help us.” It was his first acquaintance with Europe and the place where he found a little prayer meeting on the river bank.  It was here that Lydia, the seller of purple, a gentle shop keeper, embraced Christianity and opened her house for the first meeting of the little church.  It was here, too, he suffered abuse, persecution, and imprisonment.  It was in the Philippian jail that he sang praises at midnight, and the jailor and his family accepted Christ.

      This little band of Christians had undertaken to support Paul in his missionary work.  When he was imprisoned they sent money and finally one of their own number to assist him.  Because of their spiritual riches their material poverty was no barrier to their sending financial support for “in a great trial of affliction the abundance of their joy and their deep poverty abounded unto the riches of their liberality.”

      So the Philippian Church held a special place in the heart of the great missionary and he is now writing to give them their flowers while they are still living.  He says, “I thank God for you Christians at Philippi whenever I think of you.  My constant prayers for you are a real joy, for they bring back to mind how we have worked together for the gospel from the first.  It’s only natural for me to feel this way about you all,....during the time I was in prison, and also while I was out defending and demonstrating the power of the gospel, we shared together the grace of God.  God knows I long, with the deepest love and affection, for your companionship.  It has been a great joy to me that after all this time you have shown an interest in me.  You Philippians will remember that in the early days of the gospel when I left Macedonia you were the only church who shared with me the fellowship of giving and receiving.  Even in Thessalonica you sent me help twice when I was in need.  Your generosity is like a lovely fragrance, a sacrifice that pleases the very heart of God.

      Paul’s letter to the Philippians is one of the most beautiful gifts of “flowers for the living” in the whole Bible.  He didn’t wait until they were dead to say what he felt about them, to express his high praise for what they had done and were doing.  This would have been a beautiful obituary when they passed on, but it was more beautiful now, and useful, too.

      I can imagine how much stronger these Christians were in their love and friendship for Paul because of this letter.  What’s more important Paul strengthened their tie with God as he praised them for what they had already done.  It was the inspiration of “bread cast upon the waters and returning after many days.” There were many flowers growing in this letter.

The Flower of Gratitude

      “I thank my God in all my remembrance of you all.” Paul must have been a southerner for several times he says, “You all.” That “you all” had meaning, for he was including everybody in the church, not just those with whom he had a close friendship.  The blossoms of gratitude filled his letter.

      Helen Keller, despite her handicap of deafness and blindness, had gifts of flowers for a lot of people who may not have deserved them.  Once when George Bernard Shaw was told that she was blind and deaf, he rudely replied, “What’s news about that?  All Americans are deaf and blind!” 

      On learning of this remark, Miss Keller turned her sightless eyes toward the informer and said, “The world owes much to Mr. Shaw.  In his plays he has created beauty for the eyes of the beholder, lyric power for the lips of those privileged to quote his lines with proper inflection, and poetic music for the ears of those able to hear the drama of speech.” She was too much of a Christian gentlewoman to let her character be cut down to the size of the man who insulted her.

      Everything wasn’t rosy in the Philippian Church.  Some had hindered Paul, hurt him, and made his work more difficult, but Paul was a man who knew that in his own life there was much to be forgiven and so in theirs.  I’m sure as he looked back on his experiences in the church which he established and served he must have seen these things as having, “fallen out unto the furtherance of the gospel,” and therefore he was thankful for all who were in the fellowship.  Even those who appeared to be negative made their contribution.  So, this was no pious platitude or a mimeographed sales letter; it was the gift of flowers for people he loved.  

      When was the last time you sent some of these flowers to a friend, to a teacher of your children, or a shut-in whose years of active life in the church have ended, but who has left a heritage for us?  When was the last time you remembered with gratitude some person struggling against the tide and current of life to make life richer for all of us?  When was the last time you sent some flowers of gratitude to someone you find it difficult to like but whom you know to have made some contribution in something that is noble and worthwhile?  Why not do it today?

The Flower of Encouragement

      Just as surely as the apostle Paul marched under the banner of the cross he also marched under the clouds of discouragement as he endured obstacles, persecution, and imprisonment, and even slander from those who should have supported him.  The tone of the Philippian letter indicates he had received flowers of encouragement from his friends.  As he remembered the evidences that they were with him, the proof of their love in their financial support, their messages of concern, and the presence of Epaphroditus whom they had sent to help him, he must have taken new heart.

      One recalls Paul’s journey to Rome and of how some of his friends heard about him and came out to the Three Taverns to meet him.  Luke says, “When Paul saw them he thanked God and his spirits rose.” Surely his spirits soared as he wrote of thee Philippian friends, “You are partners in my imprisonment in the defense and confirmation of the gospel.”

      There are many people faithfully supporting the work of Christ’s Kingdom, teaching our children, serving as officers and leaders in the church, singing in a choir, or carrying on the work of the church somewhere under great discouragements.  What flowers have they received from us recently?

      Elijah was a great prophet and never did his power of consecration stand out more brilliantly than on Mt. Carmel where he achieved a significant victory for God as he defeated the prophets of Baal.  Yet, shortly thereafter when the wicked Jezebel threatened his life, he fled into the wilderness and sat down in despair.  There are many great souls today whose work is threatened by criticism, loneliness, and if not the threat of opposition, at least the feeling that nobody cares.  How does your own spirit and participation, or the lack of it affect these people in the work of the Kingdom?  Many carry heavy burdens, face uncertainties, and have their vision blurred by gloom.  Your flowers might make a difference, particularly the flowers of encouragement.

The Flower of Sharing

      Paul said, “It is kind of you Philippians to share my trouble.” I suppose here is the greatest scarcity of “flowers for the living.” Many of us encourage with words those who labor for Christ, but we are strangely short on sharing.

      There are people in trouble and need to whom we are quite willing to say, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” but our words are empty because we will not share and help provide the things needed.  There are people who carry responsibilities in enlisting members of the church to fill places in the church’s program, in teaching, and administrating its affairs.  We want this work done; we want our church to prosper, and we want our children taught.  How many of us are willing to share in these responsibilities?

      It is not enough to share the blessings of belonging; we need also to share the related responsibilities.  I hear like an undying echo the problems of staffing the church school, of finding adult advisors for young people, and the increasing difficulty in recruiting workers for the educational work of the church.  Every church is facing these problems and it seems that more and more Christians are shirking these responsibilities.

      How is your gift of flowers at this point?  When a man or woman dies and leaves an image of having given himself in complete dedication in the cause of the Kingdom, we hear and see many signs of commendation for so noble a life.  Eulogies come unsolicited and memory reaches across a life span to call back the labors that have followed him.  How much better it would have been if these people had enjoyed the flowers of our sharing in those labors while they lived.

The Fruit of Flowers

      Let us take a glance at what these flowers of gratitude, encouragement, sharing mean in our own lives and in the work of God.  I can imagine few things outside the grace of God having greater power and giving greater motivation for Paul to go on doing the work of God, despite persecution, hardship, imprisonment, and trials, than the evidences that these friends were with him all the way.  Their partnership in poverty, their sharing of their possessions, their letters of loyalty, and the sending of one of their own (Epaphroditus) must have been like a breath of spring to this hard pressed man of God.  What an inspiration it was to these Christians to know that this great servant of God appreciated them, and was helped by what they did.  God’s work was secured by this reciprocal friendship and these exchanges of letters filled with flowers.

      Paul knew how much encouragement was needed.  He had gotten it from Barnabas when Barnabas put his arm around him in trustful friendship at a time when all the other disciples held him off under suspicion.  Barnabas was called “son of encouragement.” What better flower is there for living?

      All around us there are people crushed by the critics who fail to see the good in what they are doing and whose motives are maligned.  All around us there are people who are bearing the burdens of life at the broken places, to whom a “word in season would be like apples of gold in pictures of silver.” A word or letter, a little sharing of their load, would give them a fresh start, revive their fainting souls, release new energy to their discouraged hearts, and put new hope in their despairing minds.  

Burton Braley has three lines we ought to memorize:

If you think that praise is due him,
Now is the time to slip it to him,
He cannot read his tombstone
when he is dead.

      Charles Dickens once said, “No man wants me, no man will give me money for my work, and desperate fears of coming to absolute beggary beseech me.” Then a nameless correspondent handed him some flowers of encouragement and perhaps kept his name immortal.

      Thomas Carlyle, filled with despair as he strolled along the arm of the Irish Sea with a divinity school student, poured out the contents of his aching heart.  Said the friend, “You will see a day when you will be first in literature and I’ll be a minister and we will shake hands across the brook.” That young man was Edward Irving, one of the great preachers of England.

      Carlyle wrote in his diary, “Life was all dreary, tinted with hues of imprisonment and impossibilities.  Irving’s advent was like the sunrise when the night had passed.” Surely this flower was of more value than it would have been at his funeral.

Flowers for the Burdens

      A little boy was found lying on the sidewalk in a Virginia city by the police who had been called to the scene.  As they picked him up, asking what was wrong, he replied, “I just went to sleep.” When asked why he went to sleep on the sidewalk, he answered, “It’s where I got tired.”

      When the burdens of life get too heavy for a little child he can put them down and lie down beside them.  Not so as we grow older, for as professor John Baille of the Divinity School in Edinburgh counselled his students to kindliness, he gave them the reason, “Always be kindly, gentlemen, for every man you meet is carry a secret burden which he can’t lay down and sometimes its weight makes him cry out unreasonably.”

      I do not have the ability or know-how for growing flowers.  At least I have never tried very hard and in this there is a great fraternity.  However, all of us can have a flower garden where we grow the blooms of gratitude, encouragement and sharing.  From such a garden will come a sweet fragrance, a sacrifice that is well pleasing to the heart of God.

      Think of what these flowers meant to Jesus when Mary brought the alabaster box of ointment and anointed him.  Jesus attached to this “flowers for the living” a value greater than feeding the hungry, for he rebuked those who criticized Mary for her action on the strength that it might have been given to the poor, saying, “The poor you have with you always but me you have not always.” 

      Henry Ward Beecher was pleading for “flowers for the living” when he said, “Do not keep alabaster boxes of your love and tenderness sealed up until your friends are dead.  Fill their lives with sweetness, speak approvingly, and cheer them with words and deeds while their ear can hear them and their hearts be thrilled by them.”

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