Bloom for His Glory

It’s Spirit Week at Redeemer School and every class is blooming! We’re celebrating our identities in Christ, appreciating our differences, and using our God-given gifts, talents, passions, brains, brawn, and humor to exalt the Lord and make Him known.

I want to encourage you with a couple of new-to-me bloom definitions that continue to deepen our understanding of the bloom blessing. 

Coffee Bloom

I am a coffee lover, so I was surprised that, until recently, I had never heard of the “coffee bloom.”  Coffee bloom is the fast and bubbly release of carbon dioxide (CO2) that occurs when hot water comes in contact with coffee grounds. This “bloom effect” occurs when you pour enough hot water on fresh grounds to dampen them, wait for the gas to release and bubble up, and then continue the brewing process. 

Why? Blooming prevents sour-tasting CO2 from infusing into your coffee. Coffee bloom also gives the grounds time to make space for water. Water can freely extract the aromatics and oils in coffee only after CO2 has escaped. 

When we take time to steep in God’s word and patiently wait for His timing, we come into agreement with our identities in Christ, yielding fullness, a flowering state, and a time of beauty, freshness and vigor.

“But whoever drinks the water that I give him will never be thirsty again. But the water that I give him will become in him a spring of water [satisfying his thirst for God] welling up [continually flowing, bubbling within him] to eternal life.” John 4:14 (amplified version)

Without Christ, we are most definitely sour. When we receive Christ as our living water, a gift from God, this living water wells up, continually flowing, bubbling within us to eternal life. We ourselves are not sources of living water, but Christ empowers us by His Spirit and works through us to “bloom” and bless others. 

Rebloom

In the gardening world, rebloom is a second bloom in the same season. How do you support a plant to rebloom?

First, you must plant it in rich, light soil that provides consistent nutrients to the plant, even when it’s not actively blooming. At Redeemer School, we are planted in rich soil. We are founded in God’s word, our curriculum is rich and deep, and we have the passions and depth of our staff to support that. 

Second, the plants must be pruned of tired and fading flowers. 

“I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit.”

John 15:1-2

There is beauty in the pruning. The Lord uses every opportunity to shape us into the likeness of Christ. The suffering, disappointments, times of weariness, grief, relationship challenges, weakness, confrontation of our own sin – all are used to shape us. Even when there is no visible bloom, there is growth and there are nutrients provided to us.

“We have hope when we delight in God’s wisdom. We eternally blossom when we are planted in the river of God’s life.” 

The Bible Project

God promises that he will complete the good work he has started in us. Be encouraged to continue to grow, mature, bud, and blossom into all the Lord has created you to be!