Upheld In The Whirlwind

Pine Trees

Whenever I travel and I see pine trees, I am immediately at home. I live in pine tree country and I love the smell of pine. I love that they are tall and stand sentinel over all the terrain. Squirrels scamper up and down them. They provide shelter for birds that make their home in the stately trees. Deer eat their bark, and I must say I feel badly for the pain that must come and the seeping afterwards.

Most people hate the mess when pine needles and pinecones drop all around them. But I don’t mind. I search out the more perfectly shaped cones for Christmas decorations and I swear I will never buy a bag of pinecones in a store! I even enjoy raking the pine needles (yes, that is strange, I know) and spreading them around my beloved flower gardens for winter protection.

Leaning Trees

Watching the wind twirl the tree limbs has its own kind of beauty. As trees dance with one another, they seem to rejoice in their living. And I enjoy observing the dance.

However, there are times when a bit of fear slips into my love of these majestic trees. Like when massive windstorms swoop in with their gusty blasts of breath that huff and puff and blow some of those massive trees right over.

What if one of them came down upon my house?

I keep an alert vigil when leaning trees sway in those winds as they did today. Not that I can do anything about it. Weather comes and goes. So far, the trees remain. Even the ones that lean.

I did see in the news that some of them came down earlier today around the area. In the middle of roads, and on top of some homes. I feel badly for those folks, yet I breathe a sigh of relief that my trees still stand.

Trusting Through The Wind

The wind is a reminder. We are fragile creatures.

Whirlwinds have always come and gone. Some, like tornadoes, leave such destruction in their wake. Life is like that. Nothing is stable on earth. The elements are always at work, somewhere. And what is not nailed down is blown away like the chaff on the wind.

What do we do in the instability?

Trust in Jesus, the One who is always stable. When our roots go deeply into the stream of living water that He provides flowing beneath us, we are safe. We choose to trust Him even when the winds seem to be very strong around us, and then we will stand strong and tall like a pine tree. For when our roots are established, our lives are safe.

Dance and sway in the joy of Him.

“But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in His law, he meditates day and night. He shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that brings forth its fruit in its season, whose leaf also shall not wither; and whatever he does shall prosper” (Psalm 1: 2-3).