Cross-pollination

I love trees. I crave being around them. It soothes my soul. I love hearing the wind playing in the leaves and seeing how the sunbeams get filtered through the branches in different patterns depending on the weather and the season. It’s comforting and calming to me. And up-lifting. Like a fresh breath of air to my soul, not just to my lungs.

I was contemplating Psalm 1 this morning, where the believer is compared to a tree planted by streams of water and thus flourishes and bears rich fruit in every season. How do trees bear fruit? A tree cannot be fruitful by “trying harder”. A tree needs to stand put, exposed to the elements, receiving sun, rain and wind to make it stronger. The richness of the soil is important but the most important and crucial component in fruit bearing is pollination. Not just pollination, but cross-pollination. Being around trees that are different from you. What can a tree do? Nothing. Just soak up all those nutrients. Just be. And let the bees do their thing. Don’t wave the bees away. They are our friends. They might seem irritating. They might even sting. But they produce honey. And the bees’ work produces fruit in our lives!

The word for bee in Hebrew is d’vorah. (Remember the prophetess and military leader Deborah in Judges 4 and 5) The root word for d’vorah is dabar which means to speak, to declare, to command (with authority), to promise and to sing. These little buzzing bees, the words we speak, might seem insignificant, but they carry a lot of weight in the spirit (like bees carry immense importance in the natural world). Dabar are utterances in the context of covenental relationships, legal settings and prophetic declarations. Don’t despise the small words that are coming out of your mouth. Don’t despise the words that God has spoken over you, His promises, His goodness. Get pollinated by the cross. The cross, His blood, speaks a better word over you, over the world, over everything. The best word. The only word. He’s our only source. The only way we can bear fruit. It’s all Him, not our own effort. No tree has ever in the history of trees squeezed out an ounce of fruit of their own effort. That’s impossible. Just relax. And submit to the bees’ work. The Holy Spirit is constantly singing over you, like a buzzing bee, declaring promises. Agree with Him. Just be.