Let’s look at this metaphor in context. In “Called Out ,” Barbara Kingsolver writes about desert wildflowers that tend to bloom unpredictably. In the year 1998, these wildflowers bloomed explosively. She describes how there were “whole new species in this terrain we thought we had already cataloged.” She questions: Where did these flowers come from? Were the seeds simply lying in the ground in wait for the opportune climate to bloom? Indeed, she writes, the “magic” of the bloom is in the timing. A seed could have the right conditions to grow, but be hindered by a lack of rain. Kingsolver, however, notes that this cannot be the case for every seed because the different...

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