I know many of you will not understand how there can be any more to say about the cutting down of this tree, (which Jesus Christ raised back up onto its cut base even as it was still in the air and in the process of falling downward). After all, millions of trees have been felled since the beginning of time. The tree harvesting process isn’t that difficult to understand. But since God helped me with this tree and since He changed my life so completely during and afterward, it should not be difficult to understand why I want to share these details in detail.
To my way of thinking, God the Creator of everything has graciously announced His presence to me. (And also now to you – as you read this). I could go way outside my personal knowledge and suggest that this tree situation may be one of the ways the Lord is announcing his return. . .
There are three other chunks of information I want to share with you: 1. How I came to use a Bible verse when I placed my hand on that tree. 2. What I was doing with my life prior to even reading the Bible to be able know that verse. And 3. I want to share what I have been doing with myself since this tree incident back in 2012. However, before I go into all of that, I still need to share my thoughts and deeds immediately after the tree arose.
So, I am standing back behind the tree. The tree has just reversed direction and is rising back up to it’s cut base. I remember how hot I was, sweat running down my back, arms and dripping from my face. I remember first feeling then seeing the tree fall away from my hand as my hand was resting on it’s bark. As I finished those words that I already told you I said, you could not have excited me more if you had stuck my hand in an electrical socket. I was buzzed, shocked, afraid and happy all at the same time when that tree started to fall.
I almost forgot to jump back out of the way of that falling tree. But I did move away, and after arriving back at the same tree I had been messaging myself from, I spun around to see that the falling tree looked like it would hit my tractor and trailer. When I threw my hands up and yelled wait, wait, wait I was not thinking about who I was yelling at. I did not think about God, or Jesus although I was already mentally trying to figure out what just happened when the tree pulled away from my hand. But to say at that moment I was thinking about God would not be true, my analytical mind was already searching for a reason why that tree started to fall after I spoke a few words – when for the previous hour I could not get it to budge.
I tell you I did not think about God until I arrived back to the tree in time to see it stop falling in mid air and start coming back at me. Then I began thinking about God.
I have cut down many trees. I am used to seeing the trees fall away. I have often seen the details of the bark of the tree getting slowly smaller as the tree falls away. But I remember so clearly seeing the details of the bark getting larger as that tree rose back up towards me. It is weird I suppose, but that bark made an impression on me. I was staring at the bark, watching it get bigger as the tree came up, I did not even think to get out of the way if the tree continued past its upright position. Somehow I just knew it was going to stop. If I had placed my hand out as I did when I said those words to Jesus, I know that the tree would have stopped right at my hand.
So after the tree stopped moving. I stood there quietly and did not move a muscle. A tear did form in my eye as I searched for an explanation in my mind. But I had none. I knew my life had just been changed. I have played chess a few times in my life, I always lose, but there is a move called checkmate whereas the game is over. I knew I had been checkmated. Even at that early stage of this tree situation I knew I no longer was in control of my life. As I stood there feeling, not thinking, these thoughts it suddenly occurred to me that God was still with me, that He was standing there somewhere close by, and He was waiting for me to make the next move.
Can I speak candidly with you about this moment? This is the moment when this whole tree situation came to a head that day. The moment, when I knew without a doubt, I was talking to God. The moment when I would speak out loud to my Creator and knew I was doing so. Even now as I write this I feel my head start to hurt, tears are near my eyes, and I am so very embarrassed that even today I have not done enough for Him, all the good that I have tried to do since this moment I, like the Apostle Paul before me, count as dung. Nevertheless, God was waiting for me to say something. I could not just walk away.
A child of television I am, all my life I have enjoyed the actor John Wayne. No matter what situation he found himself in he always carried himself tall in the saddle. Never backed down. Even in the movie The Shootist, he went to his death in dignity. That is all I could think of in this checkmated moment. Be cool, be calm, don’t let on that your even talking to God. So, fake that I was and probably still am, I slowly got down on one knee, looked in the direction that the tree was falling (and arose from) to see if it was going to hit my tractor. Which of course it wasn’t even close to falling on my tractor. Then I stood back up, took a deep breath, slid my hands into my back pockets as confidently as I could and said these most stupid words, words that will haunt me all the days of my life. It’s okay Jesus, you weren’t going to hit my tractor.
The tree, immediately began to fall right back to the ground. I had not touched it again. All I did was step back a pace as I watched it go down. I knew it would not hit me.
Even as I write these words to you, whoever you are, I must confess that as I walked around the tree on that day to take a sit on its trunk, I was not even then fully cognizant that I just interacted with God. No, my mind was filled not with the wonder of God but with trying to figure out how what just happened, happened. I was busy analyzing. Truth be told absolutely, I was trying to get myself out of a checkmated position. I had yet to accept the change to my life that God had brought.
I had yet to accept that God had won.
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