Trees grow straight up. I know, I know, this is a deep observation, but please bear with me for a minute. Trees grow up. Trees don’t grow sideways. At least normally they don’t. But here, trees grow sideways.
I’m at Pacific Beach for a few days with Pastor John to spend some alone time thinking and praying and resting and listening and planning. Yesterday I got out on the beach and walked and walked, enjoying the sand and the sound of the surf, and the ocean breezes. Actually, the word breeze doesn’t really do justice to the howling blasts that dance in off the waves of the Pacific Ocean. This is wind that you can lean into!
One of the things that you cannot help but notice as you walk the beach is the trees. They grow sideways. In defiance of gravity and in obedience to the wind the trees on the beach are characterized by the sweep of an ever present wind coming in off the ocean. They are shaped by the wind in ways that are absolutely unmistakable. The Divine hand of a bonsai artist shapes these branches with the blast of His breath, and the trees bend and grow, shaped by the wind.
These aren’t hot house plants. Greenery has to be tough to survive in these parts. No wimpy greenhouse bred plants need apply. From their birth these trees are buffeted by the ocean “breezes”, and they are tough!
And so I think about the wind… and I think about me. Circumstances can toughen me, and bow and bend me. I am certainly shaped by what blows my way. If I allow it to, if I don’t break, I am made stronger. Unlike the trees I have a choice… a choice to “stay”, a choice to cooperate, a choice to “count it all joy” (James 1). Unlike the trees I can walk away, I can rebel, and can isolate myself in self-preservation. But I choose… I choose to not run from the wind.
And so I think about the Wind… the blowing of His Spirit. Lord, how I want to live in that place where I am always in Your Breeze, in Your Wind, yes, even in Your Gusts and Gales. Lord, how I desire to be shaped by Your Wind. In Acts you came “like a mighty wind”. The Church over the millennia has been shaped by Your Spirit, carried by the Mighty Wind as it lifted it’s hands to you, spreading it’s sails as it were, to be carried as You willed.
May His Spirit blow on your life. May dim sparks be fanned into flame as He carefully guards the life that is there, protecting and blowing onto the embers as He fans them into flame. May His Wind blow on your life in might, transforming and empowering you like a mighty wind. And may you stand… living in the “place” where He is moving, slowly but surely, shaped by His Wind. Pastor Tom
I’m at Pacific Beach for a few days with Pastor John to spend some alone time thinking and praying and resting and listening and planning. Yesterday I got out on the beach and walked and walked, enjoying the sand and the sound of the surf, and the ocean breezes. Actually, the word breeze doesn’t really do justice to the howling blasts that dance in off the waves of the Pacific Ocean. This is wind that you can lean into!
One of the things that you cannot help but notice as you walk the beach is the trees. They grow sideways. In defiance of gravity and in obedience to the wind the trees on the beach are characterized by the sweep of an ever present wind coming in off the ocean. They are shaped by the wind in ways that are absolutely unmistakable. The Divine hand of a bonsai artist shapes these branches with the blast of His breath, and the trees bend and grow, shaped by the wind.
These aren’t hot house plants. Greenery has to be tough to survive in these parts. No wimpy greenhouse bred plants need apply. From their birth these trees are buffeted by the ocean “breezes”, and they are tough!
And so I think about the wind… and I think about me. Circumstances can toughen me, and bow and bend me. I am certainly shaped by what blows my way. If I allow it to, if I don’t break, I am made stronger. Unlike the trees I have a choice… a choice to “stay”, a choice to cooperate, a choice to “count it all joy” (James 1). Unlike the trees I can walk away, I can rebel, and can isolate myself in self-preservation. But I choose… I choose to not run from the wind.
And so I think about the Wind… the blowing of His Spirit. Lord, how I want to live in that place where I am always in Your Breeze, in Your Wind, yes, even in Your Gusts and Gales. Lord, how I desire to be shaped by Your Wind. In Acts you came “like a mighty wind”. The Church over the millennia has been shaped by Your Spirit, carried by the Mighty Wind as it lifted it’s hands to you, spreading it’s sails as it were, to be carried as You willed.
May His Spirit blow on your life. May dim sparks be fanned into flame as He carefully guards the life that is there, protecting and blowing onto the embers as He fans them into flame. May His Wind blow on your life in might, transforming and empowering you like a mighty wind. And may you stand… living in the “place” where He is moving, slowly but surely, shaped by His Wind. Pastor Tom
