Green Leaves

Cursed is the one who trusts in man, who depends on flesh for his strength and whose heart turns away from the Lord. He will be like a bush in the wastelands; he will not see prosperity when it comes. He will dwell in the parched places of the desert, in a salt land where no one lives. But blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him. He will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit. Jeremiah 17:5-8 (NIV)

The phone rang. The caller ID displayed the name of the school psychologist who just the day before had tested my 12-year old son, Ben, for placement into the local junior high school. After a year of prayer, my husband and I had decided to transfer Ben from our home school where he had been all his life to the public school. I was interested in hearing how he had done on the tests and more than a little apprehensive. Ben tended to struggle with reading and several years of reading intervention programs had not done much to help. The first words out of the psychologist's mouth did more than confirm my worst fears: "Has anyone in your family ever had dyslexia?" Dyslexia???!!! Where did that come from? As the psychologist went on to explain the plan for additional testing and so on, I struggled to focus on what he was saying. My mind was reeling. How could this have happened without me realizing it? I was a trained educator, for Pete's sake! How did I miss this? Did I totally misread God's calling to homeschool Ben? Had I ruined his life by keeping him from the specialists who could have diagnosed him earlier? I'd had several friends who had dyslexic children and had seen the struggles they'd had to endure. Was that our future as well? As these questions and more hit me, I finished my phone call and went to the Lord--my Rock, my Foundation.

He led me to the above passage in Jeremiah. It begins by telling me that when I place my trust solely in man (i.e., myself, my son's abilities, professional educators) that it will be like I am living in a wasteland. There is no life in that kind of trust; my heart and mind become shriveled and dried up and there is no hope. But when I trust in the Lord, I am like a well-watered green-leafed tree, able to deal with the worries and concerns and trials of life in a way that not only gets me through those trials, but gets me through them plus allows me to bear fruit--fruit such as peace, joy, goodness, patience, kindness, faithfulness, self-control, love, and gentleness (Gal. 5:22-23). Fruit that will not only increase my faith in Christ, but will make me a better mom to Ben, a better help to him when things get tough in school, a better cheerleader for his accomplishments, and a better encourager when he feels failure knocking at his door.

And that doesn't just apply to me. The other day Ben and my husband were discussing some long-ago sports event. "Was I born then?" Ben asked. I smiled at him and said, "You weren't even thought of yet." "Mom," he gently reminded me, "I was thought of before the world began." He knows the Lord. He will get through this with green leaves.

Precious Lord, we know that trials are a part of our world. Help us to root ourselves in you, so that when the trials come, we will not wither and die, but remain well-watered, green-leaved, and able to bear fruit. Thank you for being so worthy of our trust.

Janine Miller