Bamboo

The other day I was talking to Kade on the phone and I mentioned the bamboo plants growing outside of our apartment.  He said he had seen bamboo before.  They had it growing in their house once.  It probably looked something like this:

When I realized what his frame of reference was, I decided to take a picture of what bamboo looks like here in Martinique:

All of that is bamboo!  I was standing on the second floor of our apartment building when I took that picture.  The bamboo is taller than our 3 story building!  The stalks can be 6" thick!  It grows very fast.

I got to thinking about perspective.  This bamboo kind of reminds me of how the church is.  Here in our mission, the church is much like the first picture.  It is very small and takes a lot of care and "babying" to make it grow.

Where you live, the church is flourishing!  It is strong and healthy and needs almost no effort to keep it running.

Sometimes we forget that there is new growth that needs babying along...even in wards where the church is flourishing.  We are here on our mission to help those new, young members set deep roots and flourish.  We pray that you, too, will look for those who need a little extra nourishing and help them to become tall and strong.

We love YOU!  (And hope you aren't freezing this winter!)

PS
On our morning walk, we noticed this plant with giant leaves.  Do you know what it is?  It's a philodendron!  I have had one growing in my house for years and years!  It has often been on top of the chiffarobe.  At home, it doesn't have the same opportunity to grow.  There is not as much sunlight, or heat or water.  Here in Martinique it has plenty of all those things so it can flourish.  We hope that someday the church will do the same here.