Trees – Aspirational Adventures

Large tree beside a river in an autumn park — A mature tree frames a peaceful river winding through an autumn-colored park. Generated by me and AI

Back in 2023 a well photographed tree on Hadrian’s Wall got cut down. Across the UK there was uproar! But now there are headlines to say the stump is growing saplings and some of those saplings are being planted in communities across the UK thanks to the National Trust. Here’s the article – ‘Flourishing’ Sycamore Gap Tree Has Ring of New Shoots Already 3-Feet Tall

A few weeks ago our vicar did a sermon in which she compared sycamores, and especially the helicopter seeds, as how faith can be. These tenacious seeds spiral and fly all over the place and land in the most random of places. We’ve got a sycamore tree at the back of our houses and often have to pull young growth out of our back wall. There is a sapling growing randomly in the council’s flowerbed which, because we don’t have regular council people employed to pull it out is growing quite nicely. There is also a random one in our local park which marks the little crossing over one of the ditches that take the pond water out to the sea.

Random sycamores all over the place, and this is what I took from what our vicar was preaching. Our faith is random. It blows where it will. It can appear where we don’t expect it.

So back to the one that got chopped down and is now regrowing. What if that too is like faith? What if it was never meant to be alone there? What if it was never meant to be photographed by so many? The article says that it is sprouting so well because the soil isn’t so compacted because people aren’t coming to see it.

So regarding church – how often, I wonder, does church become a memorial? A “this is how we do it”? A “this is how it always is”? And faith is contained within it. Actually the curate we had preaching this Sunday just gone was talking about the Book of Acts and of how God often sent persecution to get the church to move “out to the ends of the world”. Like the iconic sycamore tree it had to be cut down to move out.

I wonder how often we try to keep things as they are, as what we know, as what we like, and I wonder how often we don’t want to move out of what we know and just see where our faith might be replanted?

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Some random trees in my local park photographed by myself last winter. Also thought everyone needs a photo with dogs in it 🙂

Two Trees

When the Bible talks of the “fall of man” it mentions a paradise garden and then two significant trees. I’m sure in paradise there would have been a lot more than fruit bearing trees. But these two are significant. I do also think that the story is a mythological story and not a factual story. My thoughts are that it tells of the human condition.

All of us inside our heads/minds/hearts have two major choices – do we choose life or do we choose the knowledge of good and evil? I’m sure there are many people already going “well of course we have to know what is good and what is evil or how will we know what is the right thing to do” but I’m not so sure if life is as black and white as we would like it to be. Lots of what we do [even Putin’s invading Ukraine, or the other atrocities that happen across the globe] are driven by the hurts and traumas we have experienced and also our putting things into good and bad boxes.

We would rather choose to know what is good and bad/evil than to choose life. In that bold statement I’m sure many would say “No I’d rather choose life” but I think it would be life with a caveat of the knowledge of good and evil.

God goes on to say that humankind has to leave paradise because if they then choose life as well as the knowledge of good and evil they will be like gods. I wonder if that is because humankind would still put that knowledge before life rather than being able to combine the two as I hope God can.

In doing some of this QEC counseling I slowly learning, as I’ve mentioned before, to let go of past traumas and to teach my heart/mind new statements about those traumas. I’ve forgiven and let people and myself go, no longer placing them or me in the good/bad box. I am bit by bit learning to look at things through the lens of “that is how I feel about it” rather than “good/bad”. Even some of the traumas that have wounded me I no longer look at as good or bad but as what is.

In fact I was working with a young woman on a project with Youthshedz and she tells her story very succinctly but also adds that all the things she has gone through are what makes her her and has brought her to the place she is. She talks of holding on to hope rather than boxing what has happened to her into good/bad. She is willing to explore the tree that will give life.

I do believe even as Christians we are not exempt from deciding whether things, people, lifestyles, etc are good or bad, and yet I don’t think God does that. I think God wants us to have life but also I believe God just wants us to trust them and talk to them and via Holy Spirit through prayer to trust them.

I was going an online yoga with Abbey of The Arts yesterday and at the end the instructor said that prayer is us talking to God and meditation is us listening to God. I think we do more praying and less meditation. Maybe we need to turn it around, hear from God/The Universe/Higher Being and so gain life and not worry about putting things into the good/bad box.

So today, not just with the people I meet but with God, I am going to try to really listen rather than just wait for my space to be able to speak.