Grow Deep, Little Trees

It was majestic in beauty, with its spreading boughs, for its roots went down to abundant waters.

-Ezekiel 31:7

Do you believe you have been gifted to change the world?

I have a friend who claims her only gifts are “unmarketable skills.” You may feel the same way. Maybe you aren’t running a Fortune 500 company or healing the sick, but what you do matters just the same. God made each of us with special talents to offer the world. Even things you seem to think aren’t important, are.

So, as you evaluate your talents, change your thinking from worthless or absent, to powerful and full of purpose!

That person is like a tree planted by streams of water,
which yields its fruit in season
and whose leaf does not wither—
whatever they do prospers.

-Psalm 1:3

You, my lovely, are a tree.

Imagine you are growing up towards the sun. As God gives you gifts and talents, you begin to sprout leaves and fruit as evidence. The more He grows your talents, the more leaves and fruit appear. Our gifting becomes a beautiful canopy that reaches far and high for everyone to see.

What is the most important part of the tree? Beyond the beautiful fruit and leaves and far-reaching limbs?

The roots.

Providing a source of income for your family, playing cars on the floor with your toddler, encouraging others in their faith- you have a FULL covering of talents that God has gifted to you, but these talents cannot survive without deep roots!

The root system must be twice the size of the canopy if the tree is to live a long life. How are you seeking God in ways that no one sees? When was the last time you memorized part of the Bible to hide in your heart? When did you water the soil to the point of saturation?

The need for our root system is evident as we grow our Tiny-Tree Talent into a Big-Tree Calling: we are attacked by wind and rain and season change; our leaves turn a shade of sickly brown without adequate water; the thick bark is chipped away in our most vulnerable places; even our branches are broken by the weight of heavy ice and snow coverings!

We WILL face hard times.

Without deep roots, our tree WILL be uprooted.

In the open prairie of my home state of Kansas, you can immediately spot where there is a stream of water. For miles you may not see a single tree, then on the horizon rises a thick line of monstrous ones! They have popped up on the banks of the only source of water, a small stream winding through the amber waves of grain, and have thrived in the deep springs.

You, my sapling, are ready to grow up. Time to stop believing the lie you have nothing to offer and that your gifts aren’t important. Your faith may have been planted, maybe even sprouted a bit, but it is time to thrive as a truly whole tree: Big canopy, but even bigger roots.

You are ready to drink deeply of the only thing that grows you:

God.

Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”

-John 4:10

Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.

-John 7:38

God is our living water, feeding us the nutrients we need to grow.

The more we dig into God’s Word, the more we pray, the more we seek Him first in all things, the more strengthened our roots become. The canopy is beautiful, but the quiet strength of the roots is essential.

When you believe what you offer the world is valuable and ordained by God, everything changes.

“They will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit.” -Jeremiah 7:18

Grow DEEP, little trees. I am cheering you on.

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