Don’t be that tree <3

We are calling this Fronday because with having the Fourth off yesterday and feeling like we had a glorious weekend day…we are back to work this morning…it looks like Friday but feels like Monday…how about you?

I got to see all kinds of red, white and blue bedecked people on Facebook enjoying festivities, but ours was kind of brown.

Brown paint for our much needed refresher of a fence that runs along the back of our yard.

Brown ribs and baked potatoes and even browned spots on the corn we grilled for dinner.

And a brown Rose of Sharon tree that didn’t make it through our crazy winter this year.

With sawing and digging and much sweat equity, we got it out and now there is just a flat area of landscaping rock that hides the fact it ever even existed. 

Sometimes as we go through the motions of life, we can wonder if all of our efforts will even matter. As we get older and a youth-driven culture makes us feel marginalized, it’s tempting to just seek ways to be comfortable and ride this thing out, isn’t it?

But that is not God’s idea for you or for me. 

Psalm 1:3 offers us the idea that we can be like a tree that is planted by rivers of nourishing water, bearing fruit in season…not whithering and prospering in all we do. 

But it is conditional. 

This promise is for the one who does not live by following ungodly counsel, doesn’t walk in the ways of sin and doesn’t become one filled with scorn. No, this fruit-bearing, non-withering life is found by delighting in the Lord and meditating on HIM day and night and then, THEN…that one will be like this tree that doesn’t have to be dug up and pitched out by the curb.

We also find, in this passage from Jeremiah, God’s best plan for living a life that continues to thrive and not only be fulfilling but also leaves a legacy of faith to those coming behind us :

“Cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength, whose heart departs from the LORD. For he shall be like a shrub in the desert, and shall not see when good comes, but shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness, in a salt land which is not inhabited. Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, and whose hope is the LORD, for he shall be like a tree planted by the waters, which spreads out its roots by the river, and will not fear when heat comes; but its leaf will be green, and will not be anxious in the year of drought, nor will cease from yielding fruit.”

Jeremiah 17: 5-8 NKJV

We live in times of great confusion and conflict abounds. 

It is more important than ever that you and I grow in our pursuit of trusting God for all things and examining ourselves for areas where we are acting more like our culture than our Savior.

When we study His teachings and draw nourishment from the living water He provides, we WILL bear fruit…we WILL remain prosperous….we WILL provide shade for others in a dry and weary land. 

As the summer heat continues to develop, maybe we could use that as a reminder to continue to remain firmly planted close the source of refreshing that is eternal. Our time here is short but the seeds we sow through our prayers and our actions will live on long after we are gone.

Be blessed today in all your greeness….you are a lovely planting of the Lord <3