Bare Trees
As a native Southern Californian, I rarely get the opportunity to experience real winter. That’s probably why I was so struck by the bleakness of the Eastern seaboard when I visited one January. Any green that was left on the trees was a drab, dark olive; everything lese was brown and gray. Even the dirt seemed sad as it lay in surrender to the ice and snow that encroached upon its territory.
The trees though were the most pitiful. In all the other seasons, they majestically reign. In spring, the wind rustles their fresh, new growths as they call for the rest of nature to awaken. In summer, they stand happily waving their bright, green leaves, proudly offering their full branches as dormitories for rainbow-colored, winged residents. Even in the fall, those same trees produce a fashion show of oranges, reds, and golds. Now here they stand in winter, naked to the cold and stripped of their glory.
But there’s the hope. Even though the trees are cold, colorless, and exposed, they are still standing. They stand because their roots run deep. They stand because that’s where they’ve been planted. They stand because experience has taught them that it takes winters to usher in springs.
Facing a cold, colorless, exposed winter season of life? Lamentations 3:26 says, “It is good that one should hope and wait quietly for the salvation of the LORD. (NKJV)
Stand firm in the tough milk & honey life moments. Allow the roots of your faith to pull in the nourishment that the Word of God supplies. Tolerate the cold as it freezes out the old, deadness that will only be a weight and a hindrance if permitted to remain. Know that seasons change and new life will break through.
God bless all the work of your hands, the thoughts of your mind, and desires of your heart.
(Submitted by my friend and author, Sharon Norris Elliott)
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