The Life of Tree

 Call this my attempt at a Psalm of praise, or a poor imitation of Joyce Kilmer. I want simply to start today by praising God for His miraculous Creation.   

Contemplating the mighty oak.  A branch.  A twig.  A leaf budding.  Stretching toward the light, soaking up life from the sun.  It starts as a small seed, a promise.  It bursts forth from its shell and a sapling arises.  And it grows.  The young tree grows up surrounded by oak, maple, ash and beech.  The mature trees shade the young, but not too much.

Roots dig down into the ground, into the very Rock, finding strength in the soil and rain, Earth and Water.  The tree lives.  Up it goes, taller and stronger.  Its fruit is good and as it ages, it gives life and seed to new saplings.  Provides air to breathe for those on two legs or four and places to live for those on wings that make nest in its hair.  

Each spring, its twigs burst forth in new buds and it rejoices in new life.  Verdant green deepens, seeds fall here and there, some to be squirreled away for winter sustenance, some carried away to another land by an avian friend, but many will become new trees themselves.  The cold rains come and lash its branches, but its roots drink deep.  

The warmth of summer, the bright sun and the oak grows strong and mighty.  All who come near it are grateful for its presence in one way or another, but the tree simply is.  

Autumn.  Leaves turn crimson and gold and then spin down to the land beneath and rot.  Thunderstorms blow and some trees are felled.  The oak will lose branches in the harsh winds.  A lightning strike splits off an entire trunk!  The wound is black and cauterized.  But the oak is made stronger by the scars.

And winter comes, cold and harsh.  The oak is bare and barren, covered at times in ice and snow.  No growth to see, but necessary rest within its protective bark.  

And then spring returns once more!  And the oak stretches always toward the light, never reaching it, yet surrounded by it, infused with it.  Perhaps it is even unaware of how the light is part of its very being, how the rain and soil run through its very veins and nourish its every cell.  

Spring to spring.  Year to year.  And the tree grows old and dies.  It falls with a great crash and its body nourishes the soil, for new life to flourish and all its young saplings are blessed by its life and by its death.

One immeasurably insignificant, vital part of the universe that stretches out beyond imagination.  And each cell that makes up the oak is as complex as a galaxy.  All formed and fashioned for God’s glory.  

Blog posts are made by fools like me, but only God can make a tree.  And if I see a bit of myself in this oak, I have to consider that God did not come to earth and die an unimaginably horrible death so that the oak could live.