Streams in the Desert August 24 Daily Devotional

I have all, and abound (Phil. 4:18).
In one of my garden books there is a chapter with a very
interesting heading, "Flowers that Grow in the Gloom." It deals
with those patches in a garden which never catch the sunlight and my guide tells me the sort of flowers which are not afraid of these dingy corners may rather like them and flourish in them.
And there are similar things in the world of the spirit They come
out when material circumstances become stern and severe. They grow in the gloom. How can we otherwise explain some of the experiences of the Apostle Paul?
Here he is in captivity at Rome. The supreme mission of his fife appears to be broken. But it is just in this besetting dinginess
that flowers begin to show their faces in bright and fascinating
glory. He may have seen them before, growing in the open road, but never as they now appeared in incomparable strength and beauty.
Words of promise opened out their treasures as he had never seen them before.
Among those treasures were such wonderful things as the
of Christ the love of Christ, the joy and peace of Christ and it
seemed as though they needed an "encircling gloom" to draw out
their secret and their inner glory. At any rate the realm of gloom
became the home of revelation, and Paul began to realize as never before the range and wealth of his spiritual inheritance.
Who has not known men and women who, when they arrive at seasons of gloom and solitude, put on strength and hopefulness like a robe?
You may imprison such folk where you please; but you shut up their treasure with them. You cannot shut it out You may make their
material lot a desert, but "the wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad, and the desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose." --Dr. Jowett.
"Every flower, even the fairest has its shadow beneath it as it swings in the sunlight."
Where there is much light there is much shade.