Just like a tree
Issue # 135 on COB on Microsoft Live
Created November 6, 2011
As I look out of my window, I see all the beautiful colors of the trees. I love autumn. The temperature is perfect outside and the trees are all of these amazing colors. The sky seems to be clearer and the wind carries the most beautiful aromas. Even tho people are gearing up for winter, nature seems to be doing a spring like dance, except things are dying...not comming to life.
While I was on a shopping trip with our pianist from church, she remarked on how beautiful the trees were and how it was kind of wierd that they were so beautiful when they were actually dying. I began to think about the process. It is not that the whole tree is dying, just the leaves. The root needs the nutrients to make it through the winter so it takes it from the leaves. The leaves turn, die and then a new set of leaves appear in the spring.
As I pondered this, I was reminded that Christ often reffered to Himself as the "tree" or root. He called us the "branches" and His Father the husbandman, or caretaker. When you think of how we come to Christ, how the whole relationship works, it can be likend to that of the trees turning in the autum. The leaves are the things that make the tree pretty, but branches do the work. They are the highway between the roots and the leaves. They also take the brunt of the winds, the bugs and the weather. The leaves are fragile and they shake off easy. When the bugs naw on them, it takes them less time to die than it does the branches. The are not strong enough to withstand the brutness of nature. The strongest part of the tree is it's roots. They are the source of life for the tree.
Christ is the source of our lives. He knows that we are like leaves. Blowing in the wind. Easily moved and swaying to and fro. Leaves that are holding on to the branches for dear life. But, like the leaves on a tree, we must die to self. We must abandon the things of this world that make us simply pretty, and put on the things of God. Things that make us strong and beautiful. Love, Kindness, peace, compassion and a spirit and attitude of giving and servitude.
As Christians we die to live. We must give back the nutrients to the root, advancing his kingdom and becomming branches. Not twigs or stems that are easily broken off, but strong and withstanding branches. As the turning of the leaves on a tree is to new life in the spring, the putting off of the old man and putting on the new is new life in Christ. It is time to turn color and shed. Become a branch and reach out to a dying world and let them know that the root is everlasting life.