A New Thing

Maples are strange trees unlike any I've seen.  They hold onto their dead leaves right up until the moment that the new leaves come in.  They don't have blooms like other trees.  At the appropriate, God given time, they just let go and new leaves come.  It's kind of crazy to look at them right now when all the other trees are blooming with new growth.


As I've looked at this tree over the past months, I've thought, "God, what do you want to teach me through this tree?"  Looking and looking, God has shown me that many times in my journey with Him, I have chosen to cling to things, habits, and sin that suck the life out of me.


"See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland."  (Isaiah 43:19)


Do I cling to things that God is no longer working in, that are basically dead like the leaf on the Maple?  Why do I long for what's been, when there's new growth just waiting to push through?  It's probably the same reason that the Israelites started moaning and begging to go back to Egypt to be slaves again.  It's all they knew.  It stunk (is that even a word?) but at least they knew how to navigate it.


Lord, help me to allow you to do new things through me.  I don't want to cling to things are not "life bringing".  Just because it's known doesn't make it your very best for me.  I want to bloom for You.


In Jesus Life Giving Name,
Amen