“God's Second Book”, Courtenay Evans

During the pandemic, I picked up a new hobby: tree identification. I live out in the country, and with more time at home than ever before, I realized I would walk daily by these beautiful trees, yet I did not know them. I did not know their names, yet we were inhabiting the same place. In my experience, when I know the name of something, I can recognize and distinguish it from other things.  The “thing,” in this case, a tree, is not just a “thing” anymore, but becomes unique and known and lovely.  My love for the tree deepens, and my connection to God’s wider creation matures. Like the words of the popular hymn: “All things bright and beautiful, all creatures great and small, all things wise and wonderful, the Lord God made them All.” This hymn sums up a core theological truth: Trees, flowers, birds, humans, and stars: We are all creatures, we are all connected, we are all the handiwork of the Creator.

In fact, nature, is often referred to as God’ second book. Augustine of Hippo, one of the foremost teachers of scripture, once said: “There is a great book: The very appearance of created things. Look above and below, note, read. God, whom you want to discover, did not make the letters with ink; he put in front of your eyes the very things that he made. Can you ask for a louder voice then that?”  

Thus, if we take time to notice, creation can then teach us more of who God is.  

In our beautiful Ephesians passage today, St. Paul prays that we, being rooted and grounded in love, may have the power together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, to know his love surpasses all knowledge- that we may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. 

We learn that not only a re we are rooted and grounded in God’s love.  We also learn that , but the spaciousness of God’s love is unfathomable!

Turning firstly towards bBeing rooted and grounded in God’s love. Why is this so important? Looking at creation as our guide, let’s approach that question this way:  Wwhy are roots so important for a tree?  Roots absorb nutrients from the soil; roots anchor the plant to the earth and roots connect to roots of other plants.  Interestingly, hHave you ever wondered why a tree growing on a rock is growing at the same rate as a tree growing in good soil? Because the roots of the tree growing in the good soil are sharing its nutrients with the tree growing on the rock. These trees are connected via their roots systems, collectively sharing resources to help each other. These same roots anchor the plant so that when storms come; their foundation is strong enough to keep them standing. 

Now turning towards tThe spaciousness of Christ’s love—why is THAT so important?.  The author’s St. Paul’s reference to the width, length, height, and depth of this love calls to mindreminds me of a compass: North, South, East, West- a love expanding to all corners of the universe. While taking an online yoga class, I recently learned that the spaciousness in the universe is enormous! Here again, creation can give us a little more insight into the character of God. Apparently, itIt takes one second for the light of the moon to reach the earth; it takes 8 minutes for the light of the sun to reach the earth. It takes 4 ½ years for the light of the nearest sun outside our solar system to reach the earth and it takes 2.4 million years for light to travel from the nearest galaxy to our galaxy. God has created incomprehensible amounts of space in His creation, reminding us of the cosmic vastness of God’s plan and purpose- a plan well beyond our thinking and imagining; and a love well beyond our t grasping. 

God sensing our need to be rooted and grounded in the spaciousness of His love, sent Jesus Christ, his only son to live and die for us. Jesus stretched his arms upon the hardwood of the cross, a tree, reaching the entirety of creation with His grace, love, and forgiveness. Through Jesus’ death and resurrection, we receive a depth of God’s love that surpasses all understanding, a fullness beyond comprehension. We are rooted and grounded in God’s love, a love connecting us all to each another. 

Our life grounded in God’s love is like the roots of the trees. When the love of God is grounding, nourishing, anchoring, and connecting us to one another then out of that place, may we participate in the healing of the world. With God’s love nourishing our roots, we have a greater openness to share our resources to bring greater health to humanity; and when storms rage, like the ones raging personally and collectively in our lives right now, we will not be blown over but rather we will be firmly anchored with the ability to hold each other up. 

And here in our broken world full of fear, anger, sickness, violence, division, and grief we find hope. We find healing in the power of God’s love and the power of this great love to root, ground and connect us to one another and to all of creation. We find peace in God’s spaciousness when we find ourselves mired with stress and anxiety knowing the minutia of our perspective. It is often said that astronauts looking down at the earth from the perspective of outer space often marvel at the green/blue marble of the planet and how majestic it is. 

I will close with an adapted prayer, adapted from one prayer initially written by Becca Stevens, an Episcopal Priest in Nashville. I close with this prayer of gratitude, in gratitude for the trees, for creation- for God’s Second Book, and all that it can teach us:

Thank you for the gift of creation and thank you for the gift of trees. Open our hearts as conifers shed their cones like tears for seasons gone by. Open our ears to old sycamores that can tell a story in their bark. Open our minds to oaks that exhale poetry. Stir our passion like poplars that reach the stars. You have taught us that there is healing in the woods and a sanctuary under the vastness of a canopy of green. Give us now a reverence for their silent witness. As we walk on parched trails, remind us to give thanks for all the rain we have known. As we stand on a limestone foundation, let us cherish all Edens and bow our heads in thanksgiving.” Amen.