weed versus tree
One of the "trees" at the end of my garden is not what I would consider a "real" tree. Not like a maple or a pine. It is one of those "weed trees" that I cut down a lot at the old house. Obviously this weed was left to it's own devices and it grew big and strong. It's nice and green so I have no real complaint about it in a tree sense. It is certainly now too big for me to cut down. Out of my control. I thought about this in a spiritual sense as well. There are weeds in our lives. And if they are anything like my garden, they need to be pulled every day. Sometimes the weeds get away from us. Maybe we missed pulling one up. Or it was hard to reach. Or we needed special tools and the weeds got away from us and grew into big trees. And now we, under our own power, cannot cut them down. To cut it down once it has grown big requires help in some form or another. One of my weeds that grew into a tree was my fear of flying. When I was a kid I had no problem. No fear. But at sometime between my kid life and my adult life a tree grew. I knew it had grown and so before my flight in 1998 I had prayed for months before. Praying that I would be ok, that I would trust God. That I was ok with dying, that I gave it all over to God. And yet, I was a mess on the flight. The fear took over. The prayers maybe cut some branches off the tree but the trunk was so big. Maybe the prayers helped keep the flight aloft, I don't know. All I know is that my fear was a tree, not a weed. Only God can break those chains. Thinking of the pastor I spoke of in the past post, he had some very positive trees. Evangelism is a tree for him. Even hearing him now, I know he is a great teacher in this area. When I knew him a decade ago this was already a strong tree for him. In the book "outliers" that I was reading it said it takes 10,000 hours to master something. That could be like computer coding, playing the piano. Also could include work in the spirit. This pastor spent lots of time teaching about knowing Jesus. This was his strength. We all have strengths and weaknesses. When I knew the pastor he was on his second wife. The story was that his first wife left him for another woman. When I knew him, it looked to me that he loved his second wife. But I was really at a distance so I don't know anything for sure. Whatever weeds of temptation there were eventually they grew into a tree and caused a huge amount of problems for him and many other people. There are those that argue that he should have stepped down and dealt with his personal problems. But he continued on teaching on what he was good at. He does have the gifting of evangelism which continues in spite of any personal failing as it comes from God. I hope he is healing and successful as a person and that God helps him to chop down any trees hindering his growth.
posted by Aphra @ 7/07/2012 10:48:00 AM
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