Day 15--Trees and Rivers

"...but they shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree, and no one shall make them afraid, for the mouth of the Lord of hosts has spoken."                -Micah 4:4

I love trees--grand, sweeping, shade trees in particular.  My father loved birch groves and Briggs taught me to love evergreens.   But, my favorites are the trees that call for climbing--ones with stout arms and generous canopies.

A shady pool at Reed Creek off Broadway

As a child, I sought out such trees because once ascended, I felt a part of another world. After the barrier of the initial branches, the tree unfolded; each crook and bend offering a fresh perspective.  A broad branch in a tall tree was a retreat from the strains of life--stable, comforting, strong. I escaped the world below in the arms of such trees.

As an adult, I no longer climb trees--sad.  I've tried a few times, but it's different.   You feel the scratches. You discover your rusty sense of balance.  And much too soon, you wonder how you are going to get back down to earth again.  Robert Frost's poem "Birches" captures a bit of this loss, "So was I once myself a swinger of birches. And so I dream of going back to be."

Still, I cherish the company of trees--walking under them, beside them, watching my children climb them. I even appreciate the more somber conifers these days. Flowers, they come and go with the seasons--they are generally short distance runners.  Trees, they reach their glory usually after a generation or more. They are marathoners, the watch keepers of our homes and neighborhoods.

Grace and I walked along the French Broad River yesterday under many grand trees. Shady trees by the river bring peace. As a teen, my boyfriend and I hung out among the trees of Shenandoah River. As an adult, I still instinctively gravitate to trees and water...water and trees...they are a timeless pairing.

From our time in DC--a grand conifer against the misty backdrop of the Potomac, Mount Vernon, VA

Perhaps because of my love for trees and water, I am always caught off guard by John's cryptic vision in Revelation, "Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more...."  No more earth as I know it?  No more sea?  As much as we struggle here at times, I hate the thought.  I know the earth. It's my familiar home. I know the sea. Within its restless motion, I find rest.

Consolation comes a chapter later with the description of a river and trees on the new earth:

"Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city; also, on either side of the river, the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit each month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations."  Revelation 22:1-2

Literal or figurative?  I know many people get hung up on this point, and I once did too.  But as I grow older, I'm more and more okay with not knowing.  I don't need to know. Not now. Whether there will be an actual river and trees or whatever symbolically equates to this-it's enough either way.  Either way, they usher in a new era, a healthier world.  What more could I ask?

"The only true life is to live as God’s redeemed servants, and that life is ours here and now if we are His. It is but a ‘stream’ of the river that gladdens us here, the fruit has not yet its full flavor nor abundance.’ It is life, more life, for which we pant,’ and the desire will be satisfied there when the river runs always full, and every month the fruit hangs ripe and ready to be dropped into happy hands from among the healing leaves."  -Alexander MacLaren

Trees and rivers hint at a fuller world beyond this beautiful--but incomplete--one.