Psalm Twenty Nine: Your Mighty Voice Brings Peace

"The voice of the LORD is over the waters; 
The God of glory thunders.  
The LORD thunders over the mighty waters.  
The voice of the LORD breaks the cedars, 
The LORD breaks in pieces the cedars of Lebanon." v. 3-5


"The LORD gives strength to his people; 
The LORD blesses his people with peace." v. 11

Dear God, 

Your power can be seen through Your creation.  I hear your voice all around me.  It is amazing how even an utterance from Your lips can bring about change.  What a contrast to the blessing of peace that You bring to Your people!  But it is when we see this power and know that you have bestowed us with your strength that we can have peace in our hearts knowing You are in control.  10/27/09

I am fascinated by trees.  Justin and my littles and I live on a twenty-acre piece of land in a little 1850's farm house with thousands of trees as neighbors.  The trees tell the house's history.  Some have been planted by inhabitants of this home a few generations ago- the apple, pear, mulberry, cherry, and crab apple trees.  But most of the trees are a result of the natural cycle of the forest.  It is one of these trees that are my favorite.  On one of Justin and my first walks through our property, I came across this massive maple tree with the most magical curved limb jetting out of the bottom of the thick trunk.  I called it "our family tree" and I told Justin about how fun it would be to take family pictures by the tree every year, sitting our children in the crux of the curved limb and watching them grow along side of the tree.  I forget what he said, but I'm pretty sure he laughed and told me it was a good idea, just to appease me.        

I don't think a day goes by when I don't admire the trees that grow here.  Every morning, after breakfast and teeth brushing time,  I pack up Molly and Josiah in the double stroller and make a right out of my driveway.  Ten minutes later, we make a right into the driveway of  "Pop Pop" and "Gramby's" house.  The half-mile walk brings quiet and peace to an otherwise loud morning.  It is my favorite time to pray.  It is during these walks that I ask God to help me be observant- to hear what He would have me hear, to see me what He wants me to see, and to understand the lessons that He wants me to learn through His creation.

I can not count in innumerable times my feet have walked these same steps.  Having grown up on the same road my entire life, and living in this same small town with no sidewalks or stoplights, and no real place to go besides the town's general store and post office, most of my walks as a child were exactly this one: up and down Sooy's Landing Road.         

We pass two neighbors as we walk- one house on our right, and one on our left.  We pass a large field that usually have a herd of deer grazing.  I love watching their ears perk up and stare at us from 100 yards away.  Sometimes, they leap, tails waving like white flags of surrender in the air, and retreat in the woods if we look too menacing.  We see wild turkeys, squirrels, rabbits, sometimes a snake or two, turkey buzzards, chipmunks, red-tailed hawks, bluebirds, and sometimes even bald eagles.  I love this land.  I love knowing what things are- what songs belong to what birds, what leaves belong to what trees, what tracks in the sandy sides of the street belong to what animals.  

I think I'm this way because of my father.  If I ever don't know something- like what a certain bird is- I can tell him the exact color of its beak or tail feathers.  

"Burnt siena with a tiny bit ultramarine blue and ivory white," I'll say, trying to imagine swirling my brush into pools of liquid color to depict just the right gray.    

"Did it fly like this," he'll make an elegant rhythmic gesture with his two hands, thumbs intertwined.  

"Yes," I'll say.  

"Did it sound like this?" he'll whistle through his teeth in perfect pitch with the bird.  I'll nod affirmatively.  

"It's a ________" he'll say matter-of-factly.  I think he's most certainly right.  At least he says it with such confidence that I will have no reason to question him.  

He learned about the land and nature's inhabitants from his father, who learned it from his father, who learned it about it from his father, and so on and so on.  The Giberson's have lived on the same land since 1637.  (To put that into context, that's 140 years before the Revolutionary War.)  They settled in the town of Port Republic as Dutch shipbuilders. There are 13 generations of my family buried in the same graveyard, right next to the only church in town- the one I grew up attending, the place I was married.  

These generations all lived on this road, just like me.  There was a time when the road was a path cut into the woods that lead to the bay at the end of the road, and then it became a gravel road laden with horse's hoof prints, then a road with deep ruts made from carriages wheels, then a corrugated pot-holed dirt road for Model T's until it was finally paved in the 1940's.  It was painful for me to leave this place when I went away to college and for my first three years of marriage.  There was always something deep-rooted in me that knew I belonged here.  The nature that surrounds me here attests to that.  It is the same as me- unwilling to change unless acted upon by an unlikely outside force.

It is on our daily walks where the nature that surrounds me is predictable and unchanging from year to year, from decade to decade, from generation to generation.  Still, it is here that I ask God to reveal Himself, and I know that He hears me.  As leaves cling to their vibrant green of summer and warm air refuses to surrender itself to autumn, the change, I feel, is inevitable.  I find myself trying to brace myself and my family for the change I feel coming too.  

"Please, God," I asked as I glare at the dogwoods with disdain, the trees that seem the most willing to welcome fall. "I wish I was like a cedar tree.  I wish my family could stay the same from season to season.  I wish I could just keep growing without the constant hassle of harsher weather.  Can you please make my family immune from pain?.. from separation of the people they love?  Cedars are always together- springing up together in clumps and patches, the generations so evident as they plant themselves in concentric circles.  Can we please all be together like the cedar trees, growing up in the shadow of family?  That's the way I want it to be, as did generations and generations of family on this road have always been."

I tried to swallow the lump in my throat, trying to push aside the feeling like God had other plans.  

God and I had this conversation a few days ago on one of our many walks together with the Josiah and Molly.  The answer I saw coming should have prepared me for what happened yesterday.    

Yesterday Justin came into the house to deliver devastating news.  My tree- our "family tree"- had been severed in a sudden gust of wind.  The very branch I was going to sit my children on year after year had been snapped off like it was a mere twig.    

I can not help think these instances are all linked together by a Divine thread, waiting until I could pull them taught and watch them fit together like three interlocking quilt squares.  

A tree that I named as "ours" over three years ago

A journal entry about a broken cedar tree written a year ago and

A prayer for permanency like a cedar tree a week ago

My tree.  My family tree.  Every tree on my property was left unscathed besides my favorite.  Why?  
I can not help but think it is God’s way of telling me that He is in control of who He will choose to sit on that branch- that permanency and security can not come close the feeling of peace that the King can give those who He chooses to endure brokenness for the sake of His own glory. 

 “The voice of the LORD twists the oaks

and strips the forests bare. 
      

And in his temple all cry, "Glory!"

 The LORD sits enthroned over the flood; 
      

the LORD is enthroned as King forever.

 The LORD gives strength to his people; 
      

the LORD blesses his people with peace.”

 v. 9-11