Promise of Rest - Seeds to Trees

Promise of Rest

By William M. Self

 

 

You see God’s Word

But God sees trees of righteousness

A Great Basin Bristlecone Pine (Pinus longaeva)

is measured by ring count to be 5062–5063 years old.

This is the oldest known tree in North America, and

 the oldest known living individual tree in the world.

 1 Peter 1:23 gives us another attribute of God’s Word…

“For you have been born again,

not of perishable seed, but of imperishable,

through the living and enduring word of God.”

God’s Word is an imperishable seed.

Seeds are an amazing thing.

They are relatively very small.

Seeds show no signs of life until they are

combines with water and the right type of soil.

When conditions are right,

an amazing thing happens…

Roots and a trunk grow from the seed.

After the seed, now a plant, is

mature it looks nothing like the seed.

Even though the plant no longer looks

like the seed, it will produce thousands

of seeds like the one that it started from.

The reason the Great Basin Bristlecone Pine

lives to be 5000 years old is the roots

grow deep and wrap around a rock.

These old trees grow in different directions and shape.

They show signs of hard and difficult weather

 conditions, yet stand with green adorning their head.

When the living, enduring Word of God

gets inside of you and I that seed changes.

Life reaches out into the world as our roots

go deep and embrace the Rock Christ Jesus.

The seasons change but life continues the grow.

By the size and shape of our lives we, too,

 look nothing like the seed that started it all…

Until fruit is produced.

From one seed come thousands

more like the one that started it all.

 

You and I have no idea how

the Word of God will shape us.

The important thing is to get the Word of God in us.

Than let the living enduring Word grow.

If we are to find rest in this life,

we must let the Word of God,

His seed, find rest in us.

Scripture Reading

Hebrews 4:1-2 NIV

1 Therefore, since the promise

of entering his rest still stands,

let us be careful that none of you

 be found to have fallen short of it.

2 For we also have had the gospel

preached to us, just as they did;

but the message they heard

was of no value to them,

 because those who heard did

not combine it with faith.

I Peter 1:22-25 NIV

  23 For you have been born again,

not of perishable seed, but of

imperishable, through the living

and enduring word of God. For,

"All men are like grass, and all their

glory is like the flowers of the field;

the grass withers and the flowers fall,

25 but the word of the Lord stands forever."

And this is the word that was preached to you.