The Giving Tree

Dear Lord,

Tonight the boys handed me a book to read, that they had plucked off the nursery shelf. Placing it in my hands, Sam said, "Read this one." I read the title aloud: The Giving Tree. I sighed.

It had been so long since I read this one. As I opened the front cover and read the inscription on the title page, memories poured in of sitting on the couch next to Mom as she read it to me, and then as I read it to her. I remembered watching the tears form as she came near the end of the story.

These thoughts swirling through my head, I heard my Mom's voice, instead of my own: "There once was a tree. And she loved a boy."

God, you work in mysterious ways. Words can be pounded into our heads, screamed into our ears, and even trip us up, and we won't hear them until they are spoken to our heart in your still, small voice.

Tonight, I was not reading of the little boy and a tree, but of a little girl and her mother.

The woman loved her little girl. When the girl wanted anything, the mother made sure she would have it. If the girl needed anything, the mother made sure it was provided. She gave everything she had...everything.
"And the tree was happy."

No matter what the girl received she wanted more, and knew where to get it. She had someone to come back to. She knew her Mother loved her, and she, well... took that for granted.

Then, the girl saw herself in the future, having everything she wanted, not a mite happy, and with nothing but a trunk to come home to.

Lord, thank you for helping me to realize what I have, before it's too late.

Help me to be more like the Giving Tree, and not like the boy...

In Jesus' name,
Amen