Myosotis: I'll Never Forget this Word
by Randy Kiel | July 18, 2025
Myosotis. Is this a rare new disease? Is it contagious? While the word “myosotis” does sound like something dreadful, it is actually a thing of beauty. It is a flower. In fact, it is the official state flower of Alaska.
Years ago, I was on a mission trip in Monterrey, Mexico hiking with a youth group high up in the mountains. At our altitude, the land was dry desert and rock; drought-stricken trees and tumbleweeds were the sign of a time long ago when enough rain had produced vegetation. But no signs of life were coming from this mountainous land during our hike.
As the youth minister, nothing put me into teaching mode more than nature. So, I began sharing insights and lessons from a newly discovered author which I was reading on the trip down from Iowa. I shared the author’s name as Francis De Sales. I left out the word “saint” because this was an evangelical mission trip and, at this time, I was studying Catholicism incognito (little did I know why). The book I was reading was called Introduction To The Devout Life.
I was teaching the teens about how God never forgets his people, even in the deserts of a foreign land upon a mountain with no sign of life nearby.
One of the kids shared how she felt so insignificant compared to the view of the city from so high up the mountain.
I tried to convey the message from my newly discovered (Catholic) author of God’s ever-presence and of his validation of each person’s significance, when my eye caught sight of something growing between a crag in the rocks. It was a periwinkle-colored five petal flower, no larger than the tip of my finger.
When I showed the kids, one immediately said, “Let’s pick it!”
“Absolutely not!” I insisted. It was from this little flower, that (Saint) Francis De Sales’ message came alive to me. This little flower was a sign that the beauty of God ALWAYS exists. Whether it is in the expansive view from the mountain top or the delicate intricacy of the tiniest of flowers, or even in his most prized creation, all of us.
We, as his children, can never be forgotten by the Father because forgetting is only a human quality, not a quality of the Father’s divinity.
Yet, after returning home to Iowa, I couldn’t forget that tiny little flower. So, I searched through many local nurseries and finally found it. I looked on the tag to discover its name and read: Myosotis. I had never even heard the word, and it did not sound pretty. Then, I read further on the tag and saw that it had a nickname, “Forget-me-not.”
Wow!
The thoughts of that day atop the mountain in Mexico raced through my mind, “I’ll not forget you” “I’ll never leave you or forsake you.” No wonder I couldn’t forget about this little flower. It is in the smallest of creation that we are able to see the grandeur of God. This was the message of St. Francis De Sales.
It is so human of us to be impressed with earthly grandeur, high achievement, popularity, and large donations, but Scripture teaches us differently. It teaches us of the power of a mustard seed that could move a mountain, of the sacrifice of a widow’s mite that was able to sustain the financial need of the temple treasury, and of a little boy’s lunch that was able to feed 5,000.
In the eyes of God, nothing is small.
At times we feel small. This is commonly due to poor comparisons.
Comparison is thought to be the by-product of original sin. It evokes shame. It is in this human struggle that we are taunted to pursue worldly success, accolades, and prestige. Proverbs 30:24 teaches us of four things that are small but wise.
- Ants - They have little strength, but they store up their food for a winter.
- Hyraxes - They have little power but are able to make their homes and survive in the most desolate of rocky crags.
- Locusts - They have no king, yet they advance in ranks.
- Lizards - While they are able to be caught by the human hand, they are placed in king’s palaces.
It is our mental health that makes us feel small and insignificant, never life. Life is our most common scapegoat to blame.
But maybe we ourselves, along with the teachings of St. Francis De Sales, could demonstrate that even in the smallest of things, we could learn that God’s beauty always surprises, and his strength is always mighty, yet delicate.
Let’s allow ourselves to be as unassuming as the Myosotis flower. And, may we continually realize, that without God, we would all be forgotten.
But with God, He will forever “Forget-Me-Not”. Oh, thank you Lord!