A few people have asked about the black necklace I wear. It is a reminder of a poem I first heard more than twenty four years ago, recited from memory by Danny Hamilton, the president of the mission I served for two years in Perth, Australia. I memorized it myself once, then forgot it, until this year, when many winds and much of strife came my way. Those very storms are what have been building me, and I have learned to be thankful for my challenges.
Good Timber, by Douglas Malloch
The tree that never had to fight
For sun and sky and air and light,
But stood out in the open plain
And always got its share of rain,
Never became a forest king
But lived and died a scrubby thing.The man who never had to toil
To gain and farm his patch of soil,
Who never had to win his share
Of sun and sky and light and air,
Never became a manly man
But lived and died as he began.Good timber does not grow with ease:
The stronger wind, the stronger trees;
The further sky, the greater length;
The more the storm, the more the strength.
By sun and cold, by rain and snow,
In trees and men good timbers grow.Where thickest lies the forest growth,
We find the patriarchs of both.
And they hold counsel with the stars
Whose broken branches show the scars
Of many winds and much of strife.
This is the common law of life.
The Wind You're Cursing Is Growing Your Roots
That is the whole thing, is it not? The wind you are cursing right now is the same wind growing your roots down deep enough to survive the next one. The tree in the open field, the one that never had to fight for anything, never amounts to much. The patriarchs grow where the forest is thickest and the storms hit hardest.
So hear this if you are in a hard season right now. Whatever storm you are standing in is not simply happening to you. It is making you. The scars on your broken branches are not proof that you failed. They are the evidence that you grew. Do not go running for the open plain looking for easy weather. Stand in it. That is the common law of life, for trees and for men.