The other day I was sitting outside and planning on getting some reading done in the Word. As I began to read I couldn't seem to get focused. My attention was elsewhere and honestly, I didn’t want to read. Though my mind was in a million different places, I felt the Lord saying to me, “Just be quiet. Be still.” So I did just that. I was drawn to this tree that is right outside the deck of my apartment. The blooms had fallen off of it and it was somewhat bare. The only thing I could see were a few tiny blooms trying to peak out. The unique thing is just a few weeks earlier the tree was absolutely full of beautiful blooms. Well here in Alabama, the seasons change quite frequently so one minute it is like summer time and the next it is freezing cold. I knew that had a great deal to do with it, but the Lord slowly began showing me something deeper.
Rivers in the Desert
So many times we get caught up in comparing our lives with those around us or even planning/worrying for our future and wondering why something hasn’t happened yet or asking why our life isn’t a certain way. While I was sitting there looking at this tree, I began thinking of how that tree used to look and how beautiful it was with all of its blooms. It reminded me of how I forget to see the beauty even in the hard season. The Lord reminded me that throughout every season (the most bountiful and the most barren) in our lives, He is still our Creator and Sustainer. He is constant. We don't always have to have these beautiful “blooms” to glorify Him. Yes, we want to strive for fruit in our lives, but there will be seasons where the fruit is not yet in season and is still having time to sprout. He is still working a new thing in our lives we just have to see it through an eternal perspective. It reminds me of the passage in Isaiah 43:19 and 20b:
Behold, I am doing a new thing;
it now springs forth, do you not perceive it?
I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in desert.
...for I give water in the wilderness,
rivers in the desert.
I remember thanking the Lord that I can be “bare” in front of Him and still be glorious, even when there aren't any present blooms. He allows the blooms/fruit to spring up at the right time even when we think we are done growing. Even in the barren seasons, there is fruit growing! The Lord uses the lyrics to this song in many ways in my life, especially during this “teaching” time:
Though I'm bare and cold,
I know my seasons coming,
and I'll spring up in Your endless Faithfulness.
(For Your Splendor by Christy Nockels)
This is such a hard lesson to learn and remember throughout the desert seasons. Many times we think we aren't producing the “right” fruit because it doesn't look like what someone else is producing. That is where the Enemy can take a hold of us and cause to grow weary searching after something that the Lord didn't plant in our lives. In the book of Ruth one thing that the Lord taught me is that she stayed where she was planted. She gleaned in her own field and in the end it produced a wonderful harvest.
Ruth listened to God and did not abandon His promises for her. I want to have this type of character that she produced as well as what the prophet Isaiah said,
And your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying,
“This is the way, walk in it,”
when you turn to the right or when you turn to the left.
Isaiah 30:21
Planted
I ask that the Lord will produce in me the desire to trust Him in every season. He reminds us constantly in His word that He is the one who waters and grows. We are to be planted right where He wants us. We don't have to worry about how “big” we will grow or if we will be like those around us. God didn't call us to be like those around us, He calls us to be who He created us to be, and in the end we will be a beautiful display of His glory (blooms or no blooms).
Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD,
whose trust is the LORD.
He is like a tree planted by the water,
that sends out its roots by the stream,
and does not fear when heat comes,
for its leaves remain green,
and is not anxious in the year of drought,
for it does not cease to bear fruit.
Jeremiah 17:7-8
Jeremiah 17:7-8
