On Having Shallow Roots

I started going to a new Church about a month ago and completed the requisite Membership Classes today.

The Church is called "Jubilee" and the founding pastor is a young man, in his mid thirties. His vision for the church is that it would be a hub for international missions. The church is independent, non-denominational, and has a steady influx of foreigners passing through its doors.

Last week there was a guest speaker there who shared a picture with the congregation. The picture began with a hand coming down from heaven, hovering over North America, grabbing a giant tree around the trunk, and trying to loose the tree from it's hold in the earth, but to no avail. The roots clung tight to the earth, going too deep to release the tree. The hand moved, came to East Asia, found another tree and pulled. This tree came out half-way, but still a single root tapped too deep to unearth and free the tree. Finally the hand from heaven came to another tree, this one had shallow roots, but they were wide, stretching all around the world. When the hand grasped the tree and pulled it was easily uprooted. The hand shook the tree to loose the dirt still clinging to the roots, turned it upside-down and transplanted it into heaven where the tree flourished, bearing beautiful fruit, that fell in abundance all over the world below.

For some time now I've struggled with the idea of not having a home. I moved from my country of birth to a country of residence when I was twenty, and failing in setting roots there, I've spent the last few years in a transient search for a place to call home, from country to city to a four month stint in Africa, and now a year in the far east, feeling ever more the sojourner, resident of the world, and ever less a citizen of any one country, and trying to identify more and more with my identity of an heir to a kingdom not of this world, and at long last I've found some freedom in the image of a tree... for the second time, though the first tree was barren, having two branches, holding up the life given up for mine that I might die and live anew by the abundant grace of God. And now this new tree, representative not of one, but of many, who have forsaken their ties to the world, having been shaken free, not without cost, and transplanted into a new kingdom, to bear fruit together, and bear witness of another tree, the first, by which all are saved.

It's an amazing image to take hold of. My prayer is that such may come to pass. There's still some filth to shake free, but I feel unhindered by my earthly ties, and all the more ready to find a home, but not one of a handful of dirt, one of grace and love and mercy, that I might grow and produce the fruit we're all made to bear.

- TPS