Green has begun to invade, as the creek starts to settle down and the tips of twigs thicken, and the air is warm enough to hang laundry out again. The daffodils are just starting to bloom, the snowdrops are that particularly endearing blue, and my forsythia is forsything. And, I rejoice to say, my friends the dandelions are coming along nicely, as is the quackgrass. The wild camomile is up and running. I haven't looked for young milkweed yet, but I'm sure it's out there. And the daylilies are upspringing wherever there's a bank suited for them (which is most places around here).

I have a strong backhanded affection for weeds. These are the plants you'll find springing up wherever the soil's been disturbed or where nothing else will grow. They colonize unfriendly habitats like gravelled road shoulders and the middle of lightly used dirt roads, turned-over soil, landfill dumps--anywhere too unpromising for nicer, more docile plants. When they've tamed the neighbourhood, then the "good" plants can move in, the domesticated grasses; and they will crowd the weeds out. But for now, the weeds are flourishing, getting a jump on their respectable neighbours.

It would be going too far to say "the kingdom of God is like a burdock bush," but I think that's better than saying "the kingdom of God is like a prize tulip." We'd much rather think of God-stuff as being precious, not common. But think of the metaphors Jesus uses--mustard plants, rising dough--common, earthy, robust, everyday. He doesn't hold himself aloof from the weediness of things. In fact, if his fondness for the company of sinners is anything to go by, he rather likes us weeds.

We may be terribly concerned to keep faith purebred, perfect, shielded from any potential contaminants--but that's our desire. It's akin to our desire to keep our faith in the most beautiful possible boxes--honouring it by setting it aside from the ugly everyday. There's a very natural, normal, rather sweet tendency of human nature to want to dress up what it loves in fancy clothing and keep it spotlessly clean and away from the ordinary muckiness of things. But that too easily becomes a tendency to declare that Dolly is too special for daily use and to put her up on the closet shelf, wrapped in clean tissue paper.

You always have to worry about prize tulips--whether they could accidentally cross with some inferior lineage, what particular nutrients they require, what carefully regulated conditions they need to produce that perfect bloom. You start them in carefully sterilized potting mix, guarding the young growth carefully against blight and pests, making sure the temperature and humidity are just right, timing the light exposure to force the perfect bloom. And for what? For your own satisfaction, your knowledge of the superiority of your plant--not really even for your aesthetic sense, if we're honest; daylilies are prettier.

Daylilies, meanwhile, look after themselves, finding any old spot to grow and bloom in, coming back year after year, and blooming whenever nature calls them to it. And being hardy plants, they flourish. "Consider the lilies of the field" isn't about the handsome fragrant white plants still decking the altar after Easter; it's about these casual footloose beauties. Wild camomile doesn't look to us for protection or provision; the trilliums take care of themselves, and so do the lilacs. And they bloom whether or not we care.

Is it better to think of faith as being something delicate, fragile, easily contaminated, to be protected from the vagaries of human error, or is it better to think of faith as a hardy perennial? I think the former attitude says a whole lot about human fearfulness and our desperate need to know what The Rules are. But I don't think it says anything about the sturdiness of God.

God has given us a wonderful gift, an irreplaceable gift, and here we are, trying to dress it up in prettier wrappings and remaking it to suit our own exclusivity, our desire to feel righteous and superior, and our need to control. Is this really trusting in God? Is this really accepting the no-strings gift of grace that Jesus died to bring us, each and every one of us, sinners most especially included (because there are no others)? I don't think so. But then, I'm more concerned about our tendency to forget God than I am about getting this faith business right. None of us has the answers, after all, something even St. Paul admitted.

God's grace, it seems to me, is as alive as life can be, and it will outreach, outlast, outpursue, outlove us. It is around us and under our feet, before and over us, tough as the roots of wild iris, persistent as snow-on-the-mountain, spreading exuberantly like wild violets. It is stronger and more stubborn even than human nature, rooting in crevices and cracks in the most desolate of landscapes, growing regardless and blooming. We can choose to uproot it from our personal gardens--usually because we're in love with prize tulips!--but it wants to creep in, like quackgrass. And it will creep in and take over, if only we will give it half a chance.