Why This Tree?

In my early days teaching at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas, I was given a parking spot in a garage that was a ten-minute walk from my building. They told me there were no spots available in the parking lot right next to the building and said I could add my name to a waiting list to get one in a future year.

Life got busy, and I kept forgetting to add my name to the parking spot waiting list. By the time I thought about it again, the deadline had passed for yet another year. After awhile, I realized that I was enjoying the walk across SMU’s beautiful campus. I never have added my name to the “close parking spot” waiting list.

And I never will.

I especially love to look up at the trees as I walk to my building. You can get quite an education by looking up through the trees at the sky, if you pay attention and really look.

Many things begin with seeing in this world of ours.

Lilias Trotter

I often wonder what it might be like to be that tree beside the sidewalk.

Trees never seem stressed. Trees aren’t rushing past buildings to rush to a stairway to rush to a car to rush to the freeway to rush to downtown to rush to the interchange to rush to another freeway to rush to an errand to rush to another errand, to rush, to rush, to rush.

Trees just are.

Trees stand calmly. They trust the sunlight will come. They trust for the rain. They reach into the soil where they are planted. They spread their arms as wide as they can reach.

And they do what they were created to do:

…bless others with shade and shelter.

…bless others with food and oxygen.

…bless others with their own particular beauty.

Trees don’t care what the other trees think of them. They are perfectly content with the way they were made, and yet they are always trying to grow, to stretch, to reach toward the sun that brings them life.

And so, this site is my tree. It will spread in many different directions and it will stand calmly and patiently, hoping to bless any who pass by and take the time to see. If you look up through these tangled leaves and branches, I pray that you will see the Lord who gives it life shining through from above, and that you may know Him better by it.

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Image: Tree with Sun (DSC06854)

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