I’ve always had a thing for willows. The weeping tree. It may sound a bit odd; I know. But there’s something about the way it swoops long and graceful in the wind…so many leaves dangling from branches, reaching down. Some of the leaflets even daring to kiss the verdant blades that poke up from beneath. It appears courageous, unafraid to spin its sorrow, knowing it will weave into joy. Like it has a story to tell, and as long as I am willing to stay, it would be glad to spew forth some of its wisdom. There’s an elegance to its dance. I stare at it and see a piece of what I want to be.
Two years ago, we walked past a willow at my in-law’s house. My heart skipped a beat as I told my husband what I had never voiced before, “A weeping willow. Hun, it’s a weeping willow.” I said it like it was a rarity, a precious jewel to behold. Maybe because I had never known, never realized what was about to escape my lips. But it rolled off slowly just the same, “I love weeping willows.” It seemed a bit silly to share something so seemingly small with him, but my heart felt it was bigger. I longed to sit below its warmth, tucked into sweet embrace, with a place to leave my prayers on bed of green. And here we are more than 730 days later with this sobbing sapling before me again. The words I spoke back then graze up against my inner parts the moment my eyes see its splendid sway. “I love the willow.” Tired daughter climbs on my back, weary from the walk we have only just begun. We continue our stroll, but many of my thoughts stay there, with the willow.
Time…it always sprints on like stream runs to river. Not stopping for us, but pressing, always pressing towards a bigger goal. Seconds trickle away slowly, but surely. The time we have spent with family and friends has come and gone. Moments spent, but memories gathered. The seconds crash up against me today, setting pulse to my bones. The beat continues, sending me to the willow.
I stand before the tree; hands brush through its crowning glory. The leaves dance to fowl’s song. Tears puddle in the corners of my eyes suddenly, unexpectedly. It’s a bit of strange and wonderful all at once. I am caught in tree’s thicket, protected by its shaded covering. Trapped inside the heart of it, where it is most vulnerable. I sit. It seems like one of those times that calls for a slipping off of the shoes. A time that God is calling me to breathe both deep and slow. Sun shines out “there.” Beyond the perimeters of the tree, where all is exposed. A lonely leaf topples from above, hitting my messy bun, before falling to the ground. A smile breaks from my lips. This tiny leaf, like one isolated tear shed, makes me remember all the tears of God’s people. I reflect on all the ups and downs of our time here with God’s children.
There are family and friends we haven’t seen for so long. Our almost one-year-old they could now meet. And our oldest-she’s got those beautiful glasses and that mouth full of metal. Those things that make her unique, they have finally beheld. They see the boy; remember the way he teases. And the smaller girls, the family laughs at their child-like glee. A closeness has developed with family, who have become more like sisters. There has been a reuniting with high school friends. Friends my husband holds dear. Thoughts of them take him back to, “the good old days.” His old friends, who have become my new. What started off as an awkward hello between us wives ended with hugs all around. Because there are those people that you can just tell are soul friends. Then there’s that woman who is so excited over God’s Word. She’s grasping deep truths for the first time, and it sparks in me a zeal. The Scriptures were opened up to God’s people in person on Sunday, something they have missed. Something their souls have longed for. There is fellowship between us. Gathering, playing, laughing. A rejoicing over a lovely young couple who looks ahead to marriage. Light peaks at me through hanging branches, all asway. Joy. Yes, there’s been much joy.
But we have also seen pain since we have been here. A hurting church, with hurting people. Questions arise over where children should attend school. And when will a minister come? A shepherd to call their own. Other churches are without pastors too. Correspondence is given regarding disunity, disappointments, sin, and grief. Battered sheep near and far are looking for protection…looking to the church, and to God’s people, for shelter. There are family divisions. Sadness. Strife. I sit beneath this tree thinking on Elijah under the juniper tree. Wonder if any of God’s own feel as if they are being slain. If they are longing for answers, longing for heaven because of the encompassing sorrow. Elijah had slept under juniper. Beneath tree, resting and mourning. And God had sent the angel of the LORD there not once, but twice. “And the angel came again the second time, and touched him, and said, Arise and eat; because the journey is too great for thee. And he arose, and did eat and drink, and went in the strength of that meat forty days and forty nights unto Horeb the mount of God.” (I Kings 19:7-8). What a merciful God…sending the preincarnate Christ to His chosen, yet downtrodden, prophet.
Then Jesus’s words enter my being. “My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death.” (Matthew 26:38). Jesus, the perfect One, was sorrowful unto death. He had gone to the garden of olive trees, as was His routine. He went there like I went to the willow. To be secluded. To pray. It was there that he told the disciples to pray that they enter not into temptation. Thinking on them at the same time he was in debilitating agony. The stress He bore as he saw what awaited Him was so extreme that His sweat and blood began to intermingle. The blood slowly dripping down his face as His thoughts rested on His precious sheep and His Father’s will. He, who knew His earthly friends would forsake, who knew the time would come that He would cry in a loud voice, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”, didn’t for a moment forsake His people in thought. He fell on His face, pleading if there was a different way, a different cup, yet submitted in perfect love to His Father in the death to come, for those who are so undeserving. This Comforter, who was sorrowful unto death, laid down His life for those who fell asleep, when He had told them to pray. For us who are so given to pride, judgments, slander, disunity. For us who hate Him by nature…He chose us. He laid humbly in prayer, sheltered in a garden of trees, in pure devotion to God. For you. For me. Prostrate in prayer in a garden of trees. The garden where an angel appeared unto Him from heaven, strengthening Him (Luke 22:43), as He had once done for the downcast Elijah. My soul is silenced as breeze nips at my cheeks. I lay down…in this bed of tree. Strengthened.
Wind lets loose a strand of hair. I open closed eyes to see the shake of the tree before me. Its long, graceful branches weep into arch, creating a round canopy that gently strokes the ground. Each string of its awning twirls separately, but the dance as a whole is what’s striking. We too walk this life as spinning leaves, as flowers fading. But the holding of our hands as we laugh and weep, as we strengthen and encourage one another, is a lovely sight to be seen. The unity of the body is what’s stunning. We are sheltered under our sacrificial Savior, who is the most splendid of all. We are never forsaken, but forever abiding in and through Him. I stand.
This trip was a nourishment of the soul. We are preparing our final goodbyes. My heart doesn’t feel ready. Why is it so hard to leave? How the heart aches. “Mom, we saw some amazing people, didn’t we?” I am not sure if that magnifies the pain or lessens it. But the more people we get to know, the fuller I become. I see here, as always, that God used the fragile to show His faithfulness. And He is faithful in showing us the fragile. When God gives grace for us to show our vulnerable places to others, He uses it as a renewing. And through the storms we all face, God is drawing us as a family, closer to Him. Friends of old, and new kindred spirits, all wrapped up in the goodness of our God.
My own pooling to the ground begins as tears descend down my face. I am held in earthly embrace. That brother-in-law of mine wraps me up strong. He gives some of the best hugs. A kiss sweeps my forehead. I weep. He’s not going to say it. He won’t say goodbye. Why? Why is it so hard to say goodbye? I gather my sensitive four-year-old into my arms, catching some of her tears as I wipe my own. There are no final goodbyes for God’s people. We line the driveway and I whisper sweetly into my baby girl’s hair, “Until we meet again…this is only until we meet again.”
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