winter trees and hope of spring

I am like the winter tree
having shed the last speckle of summer's green
with the last flourish of fall color
donned as if death was not expected
falling falling to the cold earth

All the spring and summer growth
seems to escape and fly away
all evidence that beauty had emerged
lost in winds of chilling gray
drifting drifting into my winter dreams

I am left alone
with only bare branches to be seen
and only my roots for comfort
deep down where the cold fears to go
slowly slowly the heart sings songs of hope




I think this poem might be a weird one, but sometimes I feel like the growth God has given has hidden itself away for awhile. Those in the true family of Christ, heirs to his glory, must know that their foundation, their root, is in Christ. He gives life and growth. We have been grafted in to his beautiful tree, and He will be faithful to finish this work he has started in us. So, as we eagerly await the coming spring, let us also eagerly await and pray for change in our lives. And, as always, we must give God the praise for the change that He alone can bring.

Philippians 1:6
And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.

The Return of Tumor Robin

Well, Tumor Robin lives.

Who, you may ask, is Tumor Robin? He is our own cancer-ridden (or maybe its benign, so neoplasm-ridden) robin. He lives is our yard, and he disappears for lenghthy bits of time only to reappear when our last hope for him has given out. Tumor Robin (pronounced the same way you would say Christopher Robin from Winnie the Pooh) has a large and growing mass on the back of his head, and I guess it will never be fixed. When robins get cancer, they do not get rushed to the hospital. No one sits down with them and tells them that they have cancer and discusses the possible treatments with them. Chemo? Surgery? Radiation? No, just waiting and watching for robins. They do not even know what cancer is. For robins, life is only hopping around in the back of worried people's yards and gathering worms, or whatever else it is that they eat. Tumor Robin is happy, or at least he seems to be. I don't think he has any friends because he is always alone. Yesterday, a blue jay even tried to attack him, and still he just hopped around, a little wobbly from the effects of the tumor, but still hopping around. I came home in a complete panic to study two more hours for my test, and there he was, a reminder of my complete lack of trust in God, just hopping around, eating, and letting his little tumor grow larger. I guess this is what Jesus is talking about in Matt 6, about not worrying. How could Tumor Robin worry? He has no friends and cancer, but our Heavenly Father feeds him. I want to be more like Tumor Robin, trusting God for my next breath, and not trusting myself. When I go to sleep at night, it is God who sustains me, and when I wake in the morning, it is God who gives me grace to make it through the day. God is my strength and my song, my help in times of trouble, and my kind refuge. I want to be more like Tumor Robin, and the Christians that I see with this same attitude. I want to trust God for my next breath and pray that his will alone be done in my life. To God be the glory in all things.

Matt 6:25-30, 33
Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lillies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, yet I can tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But is God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown in to the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?

But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.