And what you can’t see is important. Something big and significant might be happening long before it’s visible.
Ever heard of the Longleaf Pine? Some live for 500 years. That long life leads to strength, weight, and resistance to rot and decay. Two hundred years ago these trees became factories, bridges, homes and ship masts. It’s been called “the tree that built America.” The keel of the historic ship “Old Ironsides” is made from one Longleaf Pine.
But for the first 5-15 years, you see almost nothing. You’d never know the majesty that was to come. It doesn’t even look like a tree – you see only a spiky grass bush on the ground. You could walk past it, go home, have a kid, and walk past again when the kid was in middle school and you’d still be convinced it was a bush. But during this time a deep taproot is growing that the tree will live on until it matures.
When grass fires sweep the forest, other young trees are destroyed, but the Longleaf is designed to survive in its unimpressive bushy stage, continuing to grow its roots, waiting for the right time for a growth spurt. When that moment comes the Longleaf Pine roars upward above the dangerous ground fire level. Now it’s ready for long, strong, living. It doesn’t matter how it looks for those first years; those years will be forgotten.
Longleaf forests need fire to thrive over other hardwood trees. The fire wipes out the hardwoods, leaving great stands of Longleaf Pines. The Southeast USA was dominated by Longleaf forests until 100 years ago – the forests disappeared because the wood was so useful in construction but took so long to grow that they weren’t replanted. The thing that made it great also caused its demise.
Fire. And time. Lots of fire and lots of time. Two things you’d rather avoid. Who wants to live for years with the threat of everything being burned up and no visible results? But if you knew what it could lead to, you might see fire and time as a friend instead of evidence of hopelessness.
Jesus served three years, had maybe a few hundred followers and was killed. At the time, it didn’t look like much. But the roots of a new life-changing reality for the whole world were permanently established. Those roots began with Adam and Abraham and Moses and Israel and David and the prophets.
“The longer the preparation, the deeper the work. The deeper the root, the firmer the plant when once it springs above the ground. I do not believe that any deep work of God takes root without long preparation somewhere.” – J.O. Fraser
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This is more of The God Show. You can get caught up HERE or at the link on the right under “other writings.” We’re in the nature channel, seeing ways the whole earth is filled with God’s glory.
The God Show is five channels (in addition to the Bible) that don't change over time or according to culture, where God's ways, invisible attributes, eternal power and divine nature are clearly perceived but often missed: 1. Nature, 2. Authority, 3. Family, 4. Marriage, 5. You. Really, he's all over the place.
We’re noticing now how the whole earth is filled with birth, growth and death. The previous post is HERE.
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