Spring is something to be celebrated, especially for those who live in the Mid-west. After a long Winter, it’s time to plant and start the labor that leads to the fruit of the harvest. One Iowa town’s Spring festival highlights its Dutch heritage. In the first weekend of May, Pella, Iowa, hosts the Tulip Time Festival. It was a perfect fit for this week’s challenge!

Tulip Toren – The Netherlands flag colors flutter above two soaring 65-foot pylons

The Town Cryer leading the Tulip Time Parade

2014 Tulip Festival Queen – Leah Blankespoor

The Queen’s Flower Girl

Hundreds of parents, all in traditional Dutch dress, paraded their babies in this Spring ritual.

With the unpredictability of Iowa weather, the tulips are not always in full bloom by the first of May, and last year’s event saw snow! So, we were grateful to enjoy a the beautiful blooms of Tulip Time.

While we enjoy the beauty of Spring and it’s blossoms, I am reminded how quickly it passes. And, so do our lives. However, there is one thing that never fades…God’s word! The first century disciple of Christ and apostle, Peter, wrote that having heard and believed in Jesus, His followers lives would be transformed by obedience to the truth the imperishable word of God:

23 since you have been born again—not of perishable seed but of imperishable—through the living and enduring word of God. 24 For All flesh is like grass, and all its glory like a flower of the grass. The grass withers, and the flower falls, 25 but the word of the Lord endures forever. And this is the word that was preached as the gospel to you. – 1 Peter 1:23-25

To say that the word of the Lord endures forever means that its message continues to be relevant to every generation and every culture. Other descriptions in the Bible speak of the living and active nature of God’s word, so that it has a dynamic nature to radically transform people that no other written material has (Hebrews 4:12). It is inspired (literally, God-breathed) and brings about teaching, rebuke, correction and training in right-living (2 Timothy 3:16-17). One anonymous writing found in the flyleaf of a Bible sums up the importance of God’s word, the Bible:

• THIS BOOK contains the mind of God, the state of man, the way of salvation, the doom of sinners and the happiness of believers.
• Its doctrines are holy, its precepts are binding, its histories are true, and its decisions are immutable.
• Read it to be wise, believe it to be safe and practice it to be holy.
• It contains light to direct you, food to support you and comfort to cheer you.
• It is the traveler’s map, the pilgrim’s staff, the pilot’s compass, the soldier’s sword and the Christian’s character.
• Here paradise is restored, heaven opened and the gates of hell disclosed.
• Christ is its grand object, our good is its design and the glory of God its end.
• It should fill the memory, rule the heart, and guide the feet.
• Read it slowly, frequently, and prayerfully.
• It is given you in life and will be opened in the judgment and will be remembered forever.
• It involves the highest responsibility, will reward the greatest labour, and will condemn all who trifle with its sacred contents.”

May you enjoy the beauty of this Spring, but seek after that which truly and eternally endures: the word of the Lord. Its words can transform you life!