First Reflections Of A Green Tree
On June 8, 2016, I wrote a note in the margin of my Bible next to Psalm 92:12-15: “God still has work for me to do – and it is to speak of Him!”
I was 69 at the time. I was fearful and discouraged. This getting older stuff was no fun. I had survived a major threat to my health and life a year earlier, but the effects lingered. I was floundering in my church life, wondering if my active teaching days were over.
On that day, God spoke to me through those verses. I am now 77 – and as is God’s way with His living, active Word, He has taken me deeper into the rich fullness of that passage of Scripture and its impact on my life. And yours. When the prompt to begin blogging first hit me, a line from that Psalm landed with equal force: “They still bear fruit in old age; they are ever full of sap and green.” Thus, the heading for this page: Reflections of a Green Tree.
I, like many others, draw continual encouragement and strength from Jesus’ words in John 15 as He speaks of abiding in him: “I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.” Abiding. Dwelling in. Drawing nourishment from. It’s the same picture as being a tree, rooted in rich soil, drawing moisture and nourishment – indeed, life – from the soil in which it is planted.
October 24, 2024
Thus a tree, firmly planted in the Lord God, neither fears nor frets, even in changing and challenging circumstances, because that same God is its life-giving source and strength. King David expresses the same reality in Psalm 92.
The righteous flourish like the palm tree and grow like a cedar in Lebanon. They are planted in the house of the LORD; they flourish in the courts of our God. They still bear fruit in old age; they are ever full of sap and green, to declare that the LORD is upright; he is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in him.
And there is the purpose of being a tree: to declare the goodness and glory of God and to bear fruit that testifies to the same. And that is also the purpose of this blog, of sharing the reflections of an aging green tree: To glorify the Lord Jesus Christ and to encourage you to do the same.
South Florida boasts a type of tree that I have long loved and that, for me, epitomizes being rooted and built up in Christ, from whom I draw my life (Colossians 2:7). The banyan tree develops multiple accessory trunks as it matures, allowing it to continue to grow and spread. It gives me a visual aid for the encouraging picture God spoke through his prophet Jeremiah.
“Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, whose trust is the LORD. He is like a tree planted by 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)
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And how does that happen? Put the truths found in Jeremiah 17, Psalm 92, and another tree image drawn in Psalm 1 – and you will find an outline of how to fulfill God’s purpose for our lives.
Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers. (Psalm 1:1–3)
•Trust in (lean on) the LORD (Yahweh) (Jeremiah17:7)
•Be neither fearful nor anxious (Jeremiah 17:8)
•Be planted in the house of the LORD (Psalm 92:12-15)
oThis does not just refer to what we consider to be the “house of the LORD,” or “church” – this also refers to being born from above and placed into the household of the LORD; i.e. adopted as His children
•Be righteous; live righteously
•Do not walk with or follow the wicked, sinners, or scoffers (Psalm 1)
•Delight in and meditate on the written Word of God (Psalm 1)
The entire picture, then, Old Testament and New, is that we, as regenerated believers, children of God, draw our nourishment, our support, our strength, our purpose, and our very lives from being planted in God, connected to the Vine, drinking from streams of living water.
One last introductory word: these “Reflections From A Green Tree” are also based upon the reality the Apostle Peter voiced to Jesus when the Lord challenged his disciples with a choice: to stay or to go. I echo Peter’s answer:
“Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.” (John 6:68–69)
My prayer comes from Psalm 19:14:
Let the words of my mouth and the meditation (of the heart of this Green Tree) be acceptable in your sight, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer.