If a Tree Falls in the Forest...Does Anybody Hear?!

I have a silly little routine. Every morning I go over to our big living room window, open the curtains, and with a little leap of my heart and a shiver of happiness, I look upon the street where I live. This is done with great measures of affection and thankfulness. I am thankful to have windows. I am thankful to have a street. I am thankful to have a home. Those of you who visited us where we moved from will appreciate my appreciation. I watch the kids walking off to school. I watch my neighbour daily fussing with her yard. I gaze upon the loveliness of everything that is on my beloved street.

Well the other morning as I opened my curtains with the zest and joy that has become my custom; I was greeted by an unfamiliar sight. A work crew had assembled and were surveying the damage that the last snow storm had done to one of the trees in front of our house. A branch had half broken off, and was dangling perilously over the street. I watched them mulling and chain-sawing and thought of the joys of home ownership, and of living in a city where a crew will come and deal with “my part” of the city sidewalk. My joy turned to a gasp of horror while I watched as they not only took care of that wayward fallen branch, but proceeded to saw the ENTIRE tree to the ground. “Stop! Stop!” I cried from the glass window. “Honey, look what they are doing – GET OUT THERE!!!!” But Honey did not go. I would have run out myself, but I was in my P.J’s, and really, what would I have said? There were four of them, and only one me. In an unbelievable matter of mere moments, that tree was no longer. And I couldn’t believe my eyes.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I am not usually a known “saver of the trees”. I have never chained myself to a great oak in protest. I have never gone tree planting. It is not usually my great passion (though I do love them). I don’t know, maybe I am feeling a little sensitive because of the Great Tree Massacre of 2005 - the deforestation of my neighbour’s yard that made trees everywhere hang their limbs in sorrow as tree after tree after tree after tree came down last summer. You could not help be feel a little bit of tree sorrow at that sight, and I heard a little “Save the Trees” protest beat drumming away in my heart. I am not a known tree advocate, but there was something about this that just wasn’t right.

As I pondered about this, one thought kept coming to my mind – I am so glad that God is not like these city crews. One fallen branch and that tree was cut down in its prime. I am so glad that God does not cut me down when I have a fallen moment, or when a part of me is broken. John 15 talks about us being like a vine, and God being like a gardener pruning and trimming the branches (things in us) that are not bearing fruit. Aren’t you glad that He just prunes the branches and doesn’t mow the entire tree down? I am thankful for a God that is gentle and patient, and who wants to see me flourish and grow even though I am weak and so often broken. I am so thankful that He takes care of the broken branches and still lets me stand and bloom where I have been planted. I am thankful for a wise God who knows which branches to prune and which ones to leave. So this is what I am pondering today. And now this is me, bowing out. Heh heh…little pun there. Bowing…y'know...like a tree bow...heh heh...I crack me up.