Air, Water and Light
It may seem strange to consider but all plants, from the smallest dandelion to the mightiest redwood are made almost entirely from light, air and water. The branches we climb on, the wood we build with, the paper we write on and the pencils we write with, everything we eat, whether directly when eating plants or indirectly when eating animals that once ate plants, most of the things we wear, the oil we use to power our cities and light up our homes - all of this used to be light, water and air. “I am the vine, ye are the branches,” Christ said (John 15:5). If we are to be fruitful branches of the vine, then we need Spiritual air, light and water. Paul said that “faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” (Hebrews 11:1). Carbon Dioxide is an invisible, odorless gas that plants use with water and sunlight to create the energy and the substance of all living things. All life on Earth is carbon-based, and it gets that carbon base from the carbon dioxide that plants breathe in, turning “things not seen” into substance. Faith is as vital to our spiritual growth as the carbon dioxide in the air is vital to plant growth. Faith, like the air, is all around us. It makes up all things. We breathe in and out faith every day, often without realizing how much we use it. Any time we make a choice, part of us deep down believes that the thing we chose is better than the alternatives. That is faith. When we act, we are breathing in that precious air of faith and turning things not seen but hoped for into reality. If faith is the air, then hope is the light. Nephi talks about the importance of having a “perfect brightness of hope” (2 Nephi 31:20). All plants have cells that are designed to react to light to create and store energy. Plants even in dark rooms will grow and stretch to the light. They instinctively know where it is. Our souls are the same way. We may not remember the last time we could feel anything like hope, but our souls stretch and reach out for it tirelessly and unwaveringly. In the same way that plants are designed to react to light, our souls are designed to react to the hope of the light of Christ. We can’t help ourselves. After a brutal breakup, we can’t help but hope that every ding from our phone is them texting us back. After watching our entire platoon mown down by enemy fire, we can’t help but hope that we are somehow going to survive this. After our seventeenth business failure we can’t help but hope that our next golden ticket idea is going to be the one that makes us millions. You can sit someone down and explain to them that they are more likely to get eaten by a shark in the middle of the Sahara Desert than win the lottery and fifteen minutes later they will go out and buy a lottery ticket. Just like the sun, hope beams down on us every single day and whether or not we are annoyingly, skip-around-the-room cheerful or locked in a deathgrip with depression, our souls still light up when hope shines down on us. And last of all we have the water. “And it came to pass that I beheld... the fountain of living waters... which waters are a representation of the love of God.” (1 Nephi 11:25). Plants are 95% water. Water helps them to hold their shape, conducts nutrients and energy to different parts of the plant, and is vital for photosynthesis. Plants wither and die when they are cut off from water, and our souls wither and die when we are cut off from the Love of God. Without love, there is no beauty, no kindness, no grace, no truth. Love turns enemies into neighbors, neighbors into friends, friends into brothers and sisters. Love turns houses into homes. Love transforms sorrow into wisdom, chaos into peace, despair into hope, fear into faith. Love gives meaning to suffering, purpose to pain, mercy to justice. It is remarkable how a plant that seems entirely dead and truly beyond saving is so easily revived when a little water is given to it. We may feel that we are utterly beyond saving, but all it takes is one, small, sacrament-sized cup filled with the living waters of the Love of Christ to revive our souls and have us flourishing and thriving once more. Plants cannot have photosynthesis unless they have air and light and water working together and our souls cannot grow unless we have faith and hope and love working together. Hope enlivens our love which binds with our faith to create something beautiful and wonderful and perfect, all seemingly from nothing but a little air and light and water. “Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples. As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you: continue ye in my love. If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love. These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full. Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain.” (John 15: 8-11,16). I pray that our fruit and our joy remains as we exercise our faith as easily and as often as breathing, bask in the life-giving hope of the light of Christ, and drink deeply and continually of the living waters and abide always in the Love of God, in the Name of the True Vine, Jesus Christ, Amen.
