Each spring, my garden is home to dozens of daffodils, tulips, snowdrops, hyacinths, and bluebells. But this year, spring was very late in arriving. And yet that didn't stop the flowers from displaying their brightly colored blossoms, even amid snow flurries and ground frost. They waved bravely through wind and densest fog, dazzling and delighting us with their vibrant hues and graceful lines.

There is a lesson for us in the constancy of those flowers. They showed that the surrounding material conditions did not alter the actual individuality and perfection of the original idea. The same is true for us when outward conditions don't seem very promising.

How can we maintain our joy and continue to progress under these circumstances? By understanding who we really are. In the first chapter of John's Gospel, in the New Testament, we read: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.... All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made" (John 1:1, 3). And in one of Christ Jesus' most beautiful teachings, which has become known as the Sermon on the Mount, he declared, "Ye are the light of the world" (Matt. 5:14). Therefore, because God made each of us, we are His radiant ideas, reflecting His pure thought.

Since God is infinite, the truth is that we are the expression of His infinite nature and unlimited selfhood. Since God is eternal, we express immortality. Since God is not matter but Spirit, we in turn are spiritual. Since God is perfect, we actually manifest perfection. But material circumstances can seem to hide reality.

Because the color of a daffodil, a tulip, or a hyacinth is hidden in a dense fog, that does not mean the color is not there. It is just obscured. If your joy, goodness, and purity seem obscured by a dense mist of unpleasant or frightening thoughts—thoughts of sickness, lack, persistent character flaws—it's time to draw closer to God in your thoughts to understand your truly spiritual nature.

One way to do this is to cherish a desire to live in obedience to God's laws, and to express His qualities actively. This includes refusing to accept as reality any thought that would separate us from man's God-derived harmony. An infinite and ever-present God has to be All, whole, complete, and as His reflection, we naturally reflect wholeness and completeness. As we pray to realize this true selfhood, relevant ideas unfold to us, just as the rosebud opens to fulfill its identity as a rose.

When autumn is approaching, the skies are cloudier, the days Colder, and the rain is swirled about by gusts of wind. But the spring bulbs—nestled safely in the earth—are beginning to sprout tiny shoots that no one sees. They don't know what is happening above them in the garden. They are unaware of any prevalent material conditions opposed to growth. They just grow, utilizing the energy they have been given. Likewise, we can remain undisturbed by material conditions and live more fully our spiritual selfhood.

We possess energy, too, the divine energy of Spirit. Science and Health says something about this divine energy, its purpose, and our part in it: "Let us feel the divine energy of Spirit, bringing us into newness of life and recognizing no mortal nor material power as able to destroy. Let us rejoice that we are subject to the divine 'powers that be.' Such is the true Science of being" (p. 249). We utilize the divine energy when we focus our attention on understanding and expressing our identity as a child of God.

When we do this, we are not ignoring problems; we are opening our thought to spiritual solutions. We are accepting God as the only power and presence, the one divine wisdom, upon whom we can depend. God gives us the insights we need, not only to realize our true nature, but to accept the God-given ideas that provide right answers.

As the spring bulbs grow beneath the earth, they are using their inherent energy to overcome what might seem to be an impossible obstacle—the frozen earth. With dedication and constancy, we can use our spiritual energy to overcome the finite, limiting obstacles of human experience. With determination, we can face these challenges to our spiritual identity and harmonious existence, and can steadfastly maintain in consciousness the spiritual facts regarding our relation to God.

We are each embraced in God's spiritual seasons. They are not calendar-directed passing days. Spiritual seasons are the unfolding of ideas that bring us closer to God and help us identify our spiritual nature. This nature, forever established by God, blooms as brightly as the spring flowers, unfolds as naturally as the petals of a summer rose, grows and develops as steadfastly as the autumn bulb, and shines with the purity of a winter snow.