En-Tree #2... clever, I know...

*Something new: anytime you see YHWH in my blogs it means "Yahweh" the Hebrew word for God. The Israelite people would not use the vowels for His name, because it was too holy for them to even speak, so it was the same in their writing. As I am studying the OT, I am reminded that I serve a Holy God, and this is one way I choose to remind myself of that.

Something else I love about trees is that the majority of the tree's biomass is underground, unseen, in it's root system. Some trees have root balls, others have stringy roots, and some have very lateral root systems.

Regardless of what the roots look like, all roots push through, fight and seek out nutrition.

While working at Look Up Lodge, I had to dig-up a septic line that was broken. Upon standing in a 4 1/2 foot deep trench of human waste, I discovered that a large tree root had broken through the 4 inch thick concrete pipe.

If the root system of the tree isn't where it needs to be, the tree will never be able to grow the way it's supposed to, and will eventually die.

Another cool thing to think about is that what you see, the beauty, the shade it gives, the leaves, the branches, the fun you can have with a tree is not possible without all of the underground, unseen roots.

The more a tree's roots force through things for nutrition and grow, the stronger the tree becomes, even though no one will see all of that going on.

If something damages the main roots of a tree, the tree will surely die; but the deeper the roots go and the more they spread out and find nutrition, the stronger the tree becomes.

In life, many of our greatest struggles, deepest hurts and things we face are underground, where no one can see them. YHWH asks us to force through big things to find Him and His will, to gain nutrition. We can have problems under the surface and look great, but only for a season. The longer we ignore the underground problems, the worse off we are, eventually leading to our demise. We must seek YHWH's wisdom, go as deep as possible, and force through the hard things and grow in Him, if we wish to have a strong, beautiful, magnificent life for others to see.

In simple terms: If the tree is not good underground, nothing above ground will be any good; if we are not good inside, the stuff we try to do outside will not be any good, either.

"When solving problems, dig at the roots instead of just hacking at the leaves."
--Anthony J. D'Angelo