A Bed of Roses

photo credit to Jerome G. Rosen Jr. - as appearing in National Geogrophic magazing (Dec. 2010)

You have heard it said, "Life is not a bed a roses!"
It appears that is not always true - at times life quite literally IS a bed of flower petals.

I found a little piece in the December (2010) National Geographic that reports on a very fascinating discovery.
There is a species of bee found in the mountain slopes of Turkey and Iran whose unusual nest construction was recently observed by researchers.

The female Osmia avosetta bee responding to an inner clock knows it is time to build her nest . She begins by digging a shallow, two inch tunnel in the soft soil preparing for two or three chambers.

She then lines these chambers with flower petals that she meticulously separates with her teeth from the flowers growing in nearby fields. Petal by petal she carries them back to her construction site, gluing two or three layers together.
When satisfied with her petal nursery, she deposits an ample supply of food and lays a single egg at the mouth of the nest. Carefully, she folds an inner petal for a blanket over the egg, seals the door and folds over one last petal.
The whole process takes about two days.
When the nest hardens, it is weather and predator resistant and provides a warm and moist environment in which the larvae thrives.
It is regrettable that the beauty of its bed is lost on the larvae bee, since it develops in the dark and at that stage is without eyes to see!

How amazing this little bee is !

What single minded focus, what talent and ‘know-how’ to build such a perfect nest for its young! What wisdom is filed into its minuscule brain!
Throughout its life this tiny creature has no distractions from what she desires to do. She experiences no sense of drudgery. No anxiety over what may or may not be, disturbs her rest. There is no lack of supply to fulfil the purpose that drives her. She has no disquieting thoughts that perhaps her work might be in vain!
Her life is enviable.
What is it that makes her life so perfect that we of much greater intelligence stand in admiration and awe?

The answer is simple, is it not? This little creature lives her entire life perfectly following the wisdom and direction of the One who created her. She knows nothing of deviating from that wisdom and following her own pursuits or self-desires.

Does she not make us look foolish? Man, given free choice, seems rather unable - or unwilling- to single mindedly choose to follow the wisdom of God. We so easily gravitate to the age-old default “every man doing that which is right in his own eyes”.
Over and over God reveals His unfailing wisdom in His creation. Every flower is beautifully dressed. Every little creature is fed and cared for.
Do we have any reason to think that God would do less for us?
Yet, we doubt, we fear, we worry, we question. How foolish we are!

What greater honor can we give our heavenly Father than to trust Him completely, to look to Him for wisdom and direction for our daily lives, believing that every promise in the Book is true !!

“Have you not known?

Have you not heard?

The everlasting God , the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, neither faints nor is weary.

There is no searching of His understanding !” Is. 40:28 NKJV