THE THREE TREES

This is a beautiful story, one that will make you truly stop and appreciate the beauty of everything and how God has a plan for each and everyone of us.

            Once there where three trees on a hill in the woods, they were discussing their hopes and dreams, the first tree said “Someday I hope to be a treasure chest, I could be filled with gold and silver and precious gems, I could be decorated with intricate carvings and everyone would see the beauty”  Then the second tree said “Someday I will be a mighty ship, I will take kings and queens across the waters and sail to the corners of the world, everyone will feel safe in me because of the strength of my hull”.  Finally the third tree said “I want to grow to be the tallest and the straightest tree in the forest, people will see me on top of the hill and look up to my branches and think of the heavens and God and how close to them I am reaching I will be the greatest tree of all times and people will always remember me”.

            After a few years of praying that their dreams would come true a group of woodsmen came upon the trees.  When one came to the first tree he said “this looks like a beautiful tree I should be able to sell the wood to a carpenter” and began cutting it down.  The tree was happy because he knew that the carpenter would make him into a treasure chest.  At the second tree a woodsmen said “This looks like a strong tree, I should be able to sell this to a shipyard” The second tree was happy because he knew he was on his way to becoming a mighty ship.  When the woodsmen came upon the third tree, the tree was frightened because he knew if they cut him down his dreams could not come true.  One of the woodsmen said “I don’t need anything special from this tree so I’ll take this one and cut in down”.

            When the first tree arrived at the carpenters he was make into a feed box for animals, he was then placed in a barn and filled with hay.  This was not al all what he prayed for.  The second tree was cut into a small fishing boat, his dream of being a mighty ship and carrying kings and queens had come to an end.  The third tree was cut into large pieces and left alone in the dark.

            The years went by and the trees forgot about their dreams.  Then one day a man and a woman came into the barn.  She gave birth and they placed the baby on the hay in the feed box that was made from the first tree. The man wished he could have made a crib for the baby but the manger would do.  The tree could feel the importance of this event and knew that it held the greatest treasure of all time.

            Years later a group of men got into a fishing boat made from the second tree.  One of them was tired and went to sleep.  While they were out on the water a great storm arose and the tree didn’t think it was strong enough to keep them safe, the men woke the sleeping man and he stood and said “Peace” and the storm stopped.  At this time the second tree knew it carried the King of Kings in its boat.

            Finally someone came and got the third tree, it was carried through the streets as the people mocked the man who was carrying it.  When they came to a stop, the man was nailed to the tree and raised in the air to die at the top of the hill.  When Sunday came the tree came to realize that it was tall enough to stand at the top of the hill and be as close to God as possible. 

            The moral of the story is that when things don’t seem to be going your way, always know that God has a plan for you.  If you place trust in Him, He will give you great gifts, each of the trees got what they prayed for, just not the way they had imagined.

A Purpose Driven Life

This is an absolutely incredible interview with Rick Warren, author of
"Purpose Driven Life" His wife now has cancer, and he now has "wealth"
from  the book sales. In the interview by Paul Bradshaw  with Rick
Warren, Rick said:

"People ask me, 'What is the purpose of life?'
And I respond: 'In a nutshell, life is preparation  for eternity. We
were made to last forever, and God wants us to be with Him in Heaven.'

One day my heart is going to stop, and that will be the end of my
body--but not the end of me.
I may live to 100 years on earth, but I am going  to spend trillions
of years in eternity. This is the warm-up act - the  dress rehearsal.

God wants us to practice on earth what we will do forever in eternity.
We were made by God and for God, and until you figure that out, life
isn't going to make sense.

Life is a series of problems: Either you are in one now, you're just
coming out of one, or you're getting ready to go into another one.
The reason for this is that God is more
interested in your character than your comfort God is more interested
in making your life holy  than He is in making your life happy.

We can be reasonably happy here on earth, but that's not the goal of
life. The goal is to grow  in character, in Christ likeness.

This past year has been the greatest year of my life but also the
toughest, with my wife, Kay, getting cancer.
I used to think that life was hills and valleys
- you go through a dark time, then you go to the mountaintop, back and
forth. I don't believe that anymore.

Rather than life being hills and valleys, I believe that it's kind of
like two rails on a railroad track, and at all times you have
something good and something bad in your life.

No matter how good things are in your life, there is always something
bad that needs to be worked on.
And no matter how bad things are in your life, there is always
something good you can thank God for.
You can focus on your purposes, or you can focus on your problems. If
you focus on your problems, you're going into self-centeredness, which
is 'my problem, my issues, my pain.'

But one of the easiest ways to get rid of pain is to get your focus
off yourself and onto God and others.

We discovered quickly that in spite
of the prayers of hundreds of thousands of people, God was not going
to heal Kay or make it easy for her.
It has been very difficult for her, and yet God has strengthened her
character, given her a ministry of helping other people, given her a
testimony, drawn her closer to Him and to people.

You have to learn to deal with both the good and the bad of life.

Actually, sometimes learning to deal with the good is harder. For
instance, this past year, all of a sudden, when the book sold 15
million copies, it made me instantly very wealthy.

It also brought a lot of notoriety that I had never had to deal with
before. I don't think God gives you money or notoriety for your own
ego or for you to live a life of ease.

So I began to ask God what He wanted me to do with this money,
notoriety and influence. He gave me two different passages that helped