White

Unknown (to me!), Ginter Botanical Gardens, Richmond, VA

“Come now, let us reason together,” says the Lord.

Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow…

Isaiah 1:18

I love to plant geraniums in pots for my front steps.  There is a wonderful little produce stand in Mechanicsville that also sells flowers in the spring.  Their geraniums are a wonder to behold: dark red, candy pink, neon pink, and white.  This year I bought the dark red and candy pink – enough for four containers.  When I finished planting, there was space in each container that needed to be filled with something.  I had an overabundance of white petunias, so I popped those into the holes.  My containers have never looked so stunning.  The contrast of the dark red and the pure white is breathtaking.    

It seems a little odd to call white a color, but it is, in fact, at the extreme end of the color spectrum, devoid of either hue or grayness.  Some refer to white as the absence of color.  White has long been a symbol of purity, innocence, and cleanliness.  White is often contrasted with black as extreme opposites:  good vs. evil, day and night, light and dark, truth and lies, openness vs. secrecy.  Isaiah contrasts white and scarlet – the colors of purity and sin.

This verse is one of my favorites – a fantastic invitation to come and “reason” with God.  What a contrast this is to the idea of a Titan-like god who is sitting in heaven just waiting for someone to do something wrong so that he can zap them with whatever is close by to throw.  My sins may be many and hideous, and I may feel beyond redemption, but the Creator of the universe invites me to come, sit awhile, talk together, work through the problems, and receive a forgiveness so complete that it transforms my heart into the purity of new-fallen snow.

 Unknown (to me!), Central Park, New York, NY