I was out in the snow with my two daughters and the oldest one was running around and the youngest one was bundled up in the stroller. The snow had fallen in the night and when we got out there, the sun was shinning bright and warming the day. You could tell that the snow was not long for this world. The sun was too bright and the air too warm already to sustain the fluffy white on the ground, and God started to show me that he equips us for the storms in our lives. We, a Christians, are built for the hard times and for the difficult days and people.
Standing there in my yard I looked around at the winter wonderland that God had created. Our neighbor has a beautiful Southern Magnolia in her yard right next to our driveway. That grand tree was already fully green again. There was no trace of snow on it. It stood out in stark contrast to the snow heavy oaks and maples in our yard.
Once upon a time, long ago, I was a horticulture student in one of our states leading universities. I earned a bachelor's of science in Horticulture. I love plants. I used that degree in teaching agriculture, then I used it a little less teaching biology and earth science, and now I use it even less as a stay at home mom of two littles under the age of 5. That's not to say that I don't still have that knowledge and that I don't teach my daughter about plants, I've just come to realize that the old adage of "use it or lose it" is really true. However, standing there in that yard, staring at that tree God brought enough to my mind about broadleaf evergreens to teach me a lesson.
Short horticulture lesson. We know that evergreen trees stay green all year, hence the name. However, there are different types. There are needle-like trees, like pines and spruces that have needles, and there are broadleaf evergreens, like Magnolias that have actual leaves. Those broadleaf evergreens usually have waxy leaves. That's for multiple reasons. One the wax acts as sort of a protection from water loss. The colder months can mean drier air and therefore more loss of water tot he air from plants. The wax on the leaves prevents the water inside the plant from being lost to the air. Second, it allows the leaves to shed precipitation easier. So, rain, ice, and you guessed it: snow slide off of the leaf more easily.
So, why is all of that important? Well, God showed me just how he has equipped these plants to survived in the time that they live and grow. They are designed to not just survive, but thrive. Broadleaf evergreens were designed by God to shoulder whatever the winter might throw at them. And while I stood there in my yard marveling at the creation work of God, I felt him gently whisper to my soul, "I have created you too. You can weather the storms."
Sometimes I think we get very caught up in what is wrong with this world. It all feels very overwhelming. I find myself being like those deciduous trees. I allow things to just pile up and pile up on me. I can't seem to shake them off. They weigh me down and eventually break me. See, that's another advantage of the broadleaf evergreen leaves. They allow the snow or ice to slide off and not weigh down the tree branches. Broadleaf evergreen trees don't have to worry about broken branches. If an Oak for instances was to keep its leaves all winter they would get so weighed down that many of the limbs and branches would break off.
God designed those trees to withstand what the winter brings. He also designed us to withstand what the world brings our way.
1 Corinthians 10:13 says this:
" No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it."
God tells us in this verse that we won't be given more that we can bear. He has equipped us for what we have to face. He also says that He has provided a way our so that we can endure what is before us. I kind of think of the Holy Spirit like that waxy covering of the leaves on the Magnolia. It allows us to keep Jesus, the living water, inside of us and it prevents the things of this world from weighing us down to the point of breaking.
We have been equipped for this time that we are living in. We are facing death, wars and rumors of war, hunger, and disease. And we can stand in the face of that because we have the Holy Spirit. We can face the temptation to give up, to lose hope, to fear the future, to yell out our fear in angry words, to eat our feelings, and any other way the devil might try to attack us.
I pray that today we can all be Magnolias and hold on tight to the Holy Spirit to help us stand strong in the face of the storm.
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