The Story of the Rose

     In the yard of my parent's home are two rose beds with six - no seven - different kinds of roses. Four of them are red: small dark roses, the classic blood red, small reds, and brilliant, shimmering, heavy scarlet blossoms. One bush holds countless tiny pink heads. The foremost, the one closest to the street, is a Tripicana (I believe that's what its name is): large yellow rose with pastel pink to bright pink edges. But my favorite is the rose that stands behind the front porch. Its branches are so few in number and so crooked that it can hardly be called a rosebush. And every summer it only gives one, sometimes two blooms. Yet they are of the purest white.
     The rose is a classic flower. Grown in public gardens and forbidden palaces, used in decor and designs, the standard choice for a lover's bouquet. But what draws me to the rose in not its fulness, strong colors, or delightful aroma, but the thorns. How is is that such a beauty could bear something like a thorn? Why is the favorite of flowers surounded with a wall of protection to deter the hand of the admiror? The rose, so lovely, so beloved, and yet so painful if one gets too close. How is that?
     Most people see the thorns as the devices to protect the glorious petals. That if it weren't for thorns, the blooms would be ripped from their stems and cruelly left in the gutter to die. Once the instant delight in achieving the beauty is over, it is so often thrown away. So the rose grows defenses - keeping the careless and the grasping hands at bay. People use this to say that a woman should be the same: beautiful and altogether pleasing, but still willing to protect herself from the careless and the grasping man. This analogy does indeed have much merit. But for me it is only half the story.
     The Story of the Rose.
     On the day of its creation the Rose was just another leafy plant. No thorns, no flowers. Lots of stem, lots of leaves. No one would have guessed that this would one day be the rose we know and love. But as time went by, it became clear that something was quite wrong with the Rose. Every time she lied, every time she hurt another fellow plant of the plants in the garden with her words and deeds, one of her stems would suddenly sprout a thorn. Eventually she realized that she had lost all her friends - every thorn a painful reminder of what she had done. She blamed her friends, blamed the Gardener. And her thorns multiplied. But the Gardener still tended to her.
     One day, the Gardener began to dig her up.
     "What are you doing?" she wondered.
     "You are big enough to be in the King's garden," the Gardener replied.
     As he worked, the thorns cut and stabbed at his skin, causing him to wince from the pain, but he never stopped. He moved her to the King's garden and placed her beside the great doors of the castle. A position where all could see her.
     For a time, the Gardener was gone. Everyone laughed at the Rose. But she did not cry. She grew proud of her place. Then some men came and cut some of her stems and took them away. Soon the Gardener returned and tended to her again.
     "I was crowned King," he said. "This is my garden now. You were my crown that day."
     That was when she saw the thorn marks across his forehead. Then she cried. She knew, she understood that the thorns were her own wrongdoings - that she did not belong in the King's garden. She begged the Gardener to burn her - to destroy her.
     He shook his head. "I want the world to remember. Just as I once was lowly and now am greatest of all, I shall make you the best of flowers."
     And to this day the rose stands as the symbol of life. It is always darkest before dawn. The thorns come first before the glorious beauty.
     I have thorns, I sin. But my thorns are forgiven. One day I will bloom - full and bright like the rose.

Silver Line