Where Faith Finds a Foothold
Back in May, I arrived in Scotland a few days before the rest of the mission team. I needed some space…time to breathe, to pray, to listen. Scotland has always had a pull on my heart. Even as a little girl, I felt connected to this land in a way I couldn’t explain. It wasn’t just curiosity or wanderlust. It was a sense of calling, like God had written Scotland into my story long before I knew how it would unfold.
So, I found myself wandering the walls of Stirling Castle alone. There was no itinerary, no tour group. The sky was gray, the wind sharp, and the stone beneath my hands cold and heavy with history. Wind was curling through towers and battlements, carrying with it stories that refused to be forgotten. I was taking it all in: the weight of time, the battles once fought here, and the fact that somehow, God had brought me to this place I’d dreamed of for decades.
And then I saw them.
Tiny purple flowers, growing out of the cracks in the castle wall.
I leaned in closer.
Fairy Foxglove.
According to Celtic folklore, fairies left these delicate blossoms as gifts, or wore them on their hands as gloves, traces of unseen magic scattered in the cracks of the world. The stories are charming, full of imagination and reverence for the natural world. The Celts saw the divine in creation…in rivers and stones and wind. They believed the land itself carried wisdom, stories, and sacred meaning. They didn’t always know the Creator by name, but they were looking. They were listening. And I think God honors that kind of listening.
And as I stood there looking at this tiny, fragile plant growing out of stone, I felt God speak with quiet clarity:
“You, too, can bloom in unlikely places.”
I don’t believe in fairies but that flower had no good reason to be thriving there. It shouldn’t have survived. There was no rich soil, no shelter from the wind, just a stubborn stem pushing through the rock. There it was. Rooted. Open. Alive.
I believe in something far more eternal. Centuries later, God’s still whispering through stones and flowers. Standing in the shadow of Stirling Castle’s stone walls, I saw a reflection of what this next season will be. Hard, holy, and filled with tiny miracles I might miss if I’m not paying attention.
That’s what this calling feels like sometimes.
Like being asked to grow in a place where nothing should.
To leave the comfort of rootedness and step into the unknown, trusting that God can make life happen even in the cracks.
This mission to Scotland is not coming out of abundance. It’s coming out of surrender.
We’re not going because it’s easy or convenient. We’re going because God asked us to.
And if He can place a tiny flower on the side of a windswept fortress, He can place us in a country that’s been on our hearts for years.
I don’t believe in fairies.
But I do believe in a God who uses small things to tell big stories.
A God who places beauty in broken places.
A God who honors old traditions by pointing them toward truth.
We go because we believe the cracks are not a sign of defeat. We go because hearts, like old stone walls, can still break open and let something beautiful come to life. We go because Fairy Foxglove blooms in battlements.
And I go because I’ve known for most of my life that this was coming. I didn’t know how or when, but I knew I’d be here. Not just in Scotland but in this moment, with a front row seat to what God is doing.
When I saw that little flower tucked into the stone of Stirling Castle, I didn’t see folklore.
I saw faith.
And I felt hope.
Because God made Fairy Foxglove grow in a crack in a castle wall…
and that flower, so impossibly delicate, had made its home in the ruin. It had rooted itself in brokenness and sprouted in spite of neglect.
In cracks and stone, a flower grew—
Not by chance, but purpose too.
If God can plant a bloom like this,
Then surely, He can plant us.
—Candice, Mother, Veteran, Daughter of Christ
