Life like a Tree

We have been on deployment with the Billy Graham Rapid Response Team this week. As chaplains, we often hear despair after losing a home to a tornado or a flood. But this deployment was different, and we are realizing several had storms already in their lives.  This was the ice storm that hit S.C., heavily damaging the beautiful trees and the beauty of His creation. 

It reminded me of man, made perfect in the garden. God created man and woman to communicate with and walk with in the garden. The garden was of beauty and the man and woman had no flaws, pimples or wrinkles. All had been made in perfection, like that of it's creator. 

Then entered evil, sin....despair. Once evil came into the garden and the lives of Adam and Eve, their world (and ours) changed. 

While here in S.C. we still see the beauty of God's creation. We have seen some of the beautiful Live Oaks with the moss hanging low. The Mepkin Abbey's entrance is one of those places. The trees show their grandeur and beauty, shadowing the driveway entrance. 

But the ice storm entered, causing havoc to many places of beauty here and dead branches are being pulled away to the street. Some of the trees are being cut away and now become firewood. Those trees are no more.  

What about us? When the ice storms, or evil, is in our life...what keeps us going? Do we pull away the dead branches of sin, asking forgiveness? Or are we cut down and used for firewood? The answer to that, my friend, is what is inside you. If you have the grace and mercy, that has been offered by our God, you will withstand the storms of life. But, if you do not have Jesus, your tree will be cut down and burned as firewood.  

It is simple. Stand tall, let the beauty of what Jesus has to offer show in your life. Get rid of those broken branches and ask forgiveness, let Him drag them out of your life. There is no sin, or branch, too big for God! 

Trees" (1913) by Joyce Kilmer                           Mepkin Abbey Entrance

                                                             

 I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree.
A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the earth's sweet flowing breast;
A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;
A tree that may in summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;                                                                                                                                   
Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.
Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree

Blessings,
gs

THINK that I shall never see

A poem lovely as a tree.

 

A tree whose hungry mouth is prest

Against the earth's sweet flowing breast;

 

A tree that looks at God all day,

And lifts her leafy arms to pray;

 

A tree that may in Summer wear

A nest of robins in her hair;

 

Upon whose bosom snow has lain;

Who intimately lives with rain.

 

Poems are made by fools like me,

But only God can make a tree

Read more at http://www.poetry-archive.com/k/trees.html#kd40CchvxEgvSdXH.99