Get to Watering
This California winter has been rainy and windy (don’t worry I’m not going to be complaining about the rain… Californians should only do that very quietly-we are spoiled folk :)). Several storms have been especially windy and it blew down trees all over the place. I drove into work, and there were multiple trees down along the side of the road. It was crazy-I don’t remember this many trees coming down in years. I was thinking-maybe the ground is finally so soggy that the trees just got loose in the ground. I don’t know-it just seemed weird that so many trees were down. Then I found out-the drought was the reason for the trees coming down. It wasn’t one windy storm, it was a culmination of years without much water.
Over the last number of drought-years trees have continued to grow and push out leaves, despite the limited rainfall. And the rain that we did get, didn’t push water down deep in the ground. As a result the roots from the trees stayed surfacey, small, and weak. But for trees to withstand storms, roots need to go down deep into the soil-so that when the wind blows they have a strong foundation to withstand the storm.
For trees to withstand storms they need a strong, deep network of thick roots. For humans to survive storms, we need the same things a strong, deep network of thick roots in our:
Work life
Emotional life
Relational life
Spiritual life
Physical life
How many times have you said:
I’m just spread too thin, I don’t feel like I can do anything well.
I’m emotionally spent, I don’t have anything more to draw on.
I just feel so alone, I don’t have any close friends.
I need to dig into my spiritual life, I don’t have any grounding.
I haven’t been active in months, I can feel my lack of activity.
Here’s the truth, we need to feed each of these areas of our life. If we’re not devoting some time and energy watering our lives then we end up with these weak, surfacy, thin root systems that may make us look real good on the outside but when the storm hits we fall over. All these years, these trees pushed out leaves and even grew taller and bigger but when the wind showed up they fell over. For years we can stand and make it through some storms, from the outside we look like we’re doing fine, but we’re not building our root system and eventually a storm will come and expose our weakness.
What’s one thing you can do today to grow your roots deep? Is there one project you can say “no” to, can you make one phone call to a friend you haven’t chatted with in a while, can you take a 15 minute break and go for a walk, or pick up your Bible and spend a few minutes with God. Everytime you choose to water, you grow your roots deep and strong so when the storms come you will stand. Get to watering.