Volume 29, No.18                                     
May 2, 2004

The Sweet Life

   Here’s the latest buzz on bees.

   When the energetic insects forage for food, they visit up to 100 flowers during each trip from the hive, never stopping twice at the same plant. A typical honeybee travels 500 miles in its lifetime.  That’s like a human circling the earth two times.

   At each flower, a bee lowers a long, sucking tube into the nectar.  It stores that nectar in a special “honey stomach”, then flies back to the hive.  There, they spit the nectar into one of the honeycomb cells where other bees suck up and regurgitate it — a process sometimes repeated up to 50 times — so that water evaporation and enzymes from the bees’ saliva can produce honey.

   During this collection of nectar, bees also pick up pollen which sticks to their body hair and gets pushed into “baskets”  on their hind legs.  Various kinds of pollen get mixed as the bees brush against each other in the hive, or enter different kinds of flowers.  That leads to cross-pollination, the process by which one flower is fertilized by pollen from another, which results in fruit.

   That’s significant because a full third of what we eat comes from plants that depend on insect pollination. Without bees, the human diet would be severely limited.  And interestingly, bees themselves eat both the pollen and nectar they collect.  The nectar supplies sugar for energy and the pollen provides protein, vitamins and minerals essential for growth and reproduction.  An adult bee converts some of the pollen into milk it feeds its larvae through glands in the head.

   As for their honey, bees store it for use as food during seasons when flowers don’t bloom, including winters, rainy seasons or droughts.  When lots of nectar-producing plants blossom, bees stormuch more honey than they could ever eat.

   Bees also collect water which is used to cool the hive during hot weather by spreading it on every surface and fanning it with their wings.  That air-conditioning-through-evaporation is so effective, bees on a lava field once kept their hive at a constant  97 degrees Fahrenheit when the surrounding air temperature hit 140.

   Water, pollen and honey-making nectar.  The spiritual equivalent are hope, faith and life-changing love.  And make no mistake, going the distance for each takes a colossal effort.

   As we go through life, we must drink deeply of the love we can find in everyone, if we’re willing.  The secret is to store love in the heart, but not leave it there.  Despite the risk, love is meant to be shared with others who enrich the experience.  That exchange isn’t always pretty, but it turns love into a sweet elixir that energizes our life, sustains our spirit and provides a powerful reserve for seasons of emotional drought or dreariness.
 
  But that love must be paired with the spiritual pollen of faith, a bed-Rock trust and reliance on a Saviour who surrounds us with ever-increasing evidence of his care.  Since each of us learns faith in a different fashion, it’s effect is fullest when we exchange our insight and experience.  By sharing our stories and struggles, defeats and victories, we encourage one another and formulate the fuel that’s essential for the growth and reproduction of the Gospel.  It’s that kind of faith that nourishes our young, nurtures our own development and nurses back to health even the most shaky relationship with God. When it’s Cross-pollinated, faith bears the fruit that feeds the soul.

   Even so, faith and love must be mingled with a relevant, refreshing hope. When everything around us heats up and threatens to deplete or destroy us, we must remember the promise God makes to all who find themselves living at a distance from him.  Listen up: “’I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord.  Plans to prosper you and not to harm you;  plans to give you hope and a future.  You’ll call upon Me and ... I’ll be found by you.’”    (Jer. 29:11-14)  In Jesus, we lose the sting of death and find the honeyed holiness that sustains us with his purpose, power and presence.  Sweet.

By Rick Gamble, published in Cross Current, the weekly newsletter of the Followers of Christ congregation in Brantford, Ontario, Canada.  Reprint at will in not-for-profit publications.  To subscribe, contact sgamble@bfree.on.ca