California Road Trip--Life Lessons Along the Way pt. 7 Redwoods: Giants that Share

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Growing up in Washington, the Evergreen State, I was always around and among trees—Douglas Fir, Spruce, Pine and the Western Hemlock—the State Tree. When I came to California for the first time, I drove Highway 101, and was able to experience the Redwoods. I was amazed. I went back to the Redwoods a couple more times, realizing it’s the perfect place for a road trip. Not only are those trees beautiful to see, but there are also some spiritual lessons that can be learned from them.

For clarification, I’m focusing on the Coastal Redwoods, which are not the same as the Sequoias that are found more inland (they are related—kind of like cousins). The Coastal Redwoods are some of the oldest living organisms on earth. Some of the Redwoods alive today were here during the time of the Roman Empire and at the time of Christ. They are over 2,000 years old! The tallest known redwood is about 380’ tall.  

Redwoods can reproduce by seed (about the size of a tomato seed), from new sprouts, from a stump, or a downed tree’s root system. Their roots systems are relatively shallow compared to the size of the tree (about 6’-12’ deep), but they can extend up to a hundred feet, and through their system hold on to each other. For the Coastal Redwoods, 40% of their moisture intake comes from fog.

Whether it’s the Redwoods or Sequoias, trees like this get your attention when you see them for the first time. It’s kind of like when you see the Grand Canyon—you are overtaken by their size and beauty. You can’t help but be overwhelmed.

The Psalmist writes, “Lord my God, you are very great. The trees of the LORD are very well watered… There the birds make their nests,” (Psalm 104:1, 16, 17). All living things, created by God, have a “vocation,” or a means through which love can be shared and reflected. What is love? Biblical love is an action. It provides, protects, shares, gives, and sacrifices. It’s always an outward focus that benefits something else, and thereby benefits itself.

While doing some research on trees, I discovered some very cool things. One of them is that trees can “talk,” or communicate to each other. It’s been dubbed the “Wood Wide Web.” Trees may look like solitary individuals, but underground we find a different story. Underground, trees communicate and share through a network of fungi that grow around and inside their roots. By plugging in to the fungal network, trees can share resources with each other. Older trees use their nutrients to supply shaded seedlings with sugar, giving them a better chance of survival. They also use the network to send messages to one another. If attacked, they send chemical signals through their roots warning their neighbors to raise their defenses. The hidden network creates a thriving community between individuals—part of a big super organism, swapping food and information. Even trees reflect the sharing nature of God, their designer. So, I can go out on a limb and say, “trees can love.”

In learning about the Coastal Redwoods I was also amazed to find out that no one had ever really taken a look up in the tops of these massive trees. It’s been only since the 1990’s that someone took the opportunity to actually climb up and take a look. That first person was a guy by the name of Stephen Sillett. Sillet was a professor at Humboldt State, and an expert in the area of tall trees. He was the first one to ascend into the Redwood’s canopy, and discovered a whole new world and eco system. The canopies are made up of branches, thicker than one would think. Thick mats of accumulated soil becomes the medium in which other plants and animals can live. Berry bushes like huckleberries, flowers, ferns, plants and trees, invertebrates, animals and birds have been found in their canopies. Those giants offer themselves, and share for the benefit of other life and organisms.

Trees, the more you find out about them, the more you want to go and give them a big hug! And, after hugging the tree, praise God for what amazing things they are. We can learn things about God, the Creator, by trees. His fingerprints are all over them. Coastal Redwoods are giants that share. Trees give, by releasing oxygen, providing beauty, food and protection. Trees have been giving life long before human beings had a clue oxygen existed. They absorb carbon dioxide, they remove and store the carbon, while releasing oxygen. Trees clean the air.

In Psalm 1, we are encouraged to be like the tree “planted by steams of water… yields its fruit in season, and leaves do not wither.” They absorb, so they can share. That’s what we have been called to do as well. Absorb the living water and nutrients found in God’s Word, and release life and love and hope into the world around us. “We love, because he first loved us.” It was on a tree that Jesus absorbed all the contaminates of sin emitted from fallen humanity, and in exchange, breathed forth life and forgiveness.

As we leave the beautiful forest of Redwoods, I leave you with this thought I read: God delights in trees. “They are the only thing to which God gives a ring on each birthday.”

It’s great traveling with you.

Blessings.

California Road Trip--Life Lessons Along the Way pt 6 Disneyland: THE Happiest Place

Disneyland had its grand opening 67 years ago this summer—July 17, 1955. Disneyland made a utopian statement. As suburban developments were being created during the postwar era, there was a concern that the idea of small-town America would be lost. Disneyland sought to reassure a new generation that it could still exist.

Walt Disney intended Disneyland to be, literally, the “happiest place on earth.” The fundamental purpose was to promote human happiness. It was family oriented and child centered.

The concept for the theme park, Walt Disney stated, came from his time spent on Saturdays when he would take his daughters to a merry-go-round in Griffith Park in Los Angeles. As they rode, he thought and dreamed. Disney traveled extensively, visited many places, and began to imagine a more complete theme park that would be shaped by themes and people as characters. His dream became a reality, and it would forever change not just the land and development of Orange County and Southern California, but (in a philosophical way) ideas about life as well.

Disneyland was purposefully divided into separate theme areas (I’m sure we all have our favorites). At the entrance to Disneyland is Main Street USA. Main Street is patterned after a typical Midwest town of the early 20^th century. It is the first area guests see when they enter the park and it is how guests reach Central Plaza. It represents carefree times, and happy memories of the past. There’s a train station, town square, movie theater, city hall, fire station, shops and stores. The Central Plaza is a portal to most of the themed lands.

Frontierland recreates the setting of pioneer days along the American Frontier. Adventureland was designed to recreate the feel of an exotic tropical place in far-off regions of the world—to remote jungles of Asia and Africa. Fantasyland is all about imagination. Tomorrowland looks forward to the future. It was faith in the future, centered in Tomorrowland, that projected Frontierland and Main Street USA forward into an unfolding history of technology, prosperity, and social order.

Here’s the deal—Disneyland is a happy place. For me, personally, all of my memories of times there are good ones. Back in the day, my wife Amy worked at Coke Terrace in Tomorrowland, and then at Pendleton Woolen Mills in Frontierland. In September of 1989, in New Orleans Square, I proposed to Amy on the balcony of the Disney Gallery during the fireworks show. She said “Yes!” To celebrate, we then went on the Pirates of the Caribbean ride. I love the times with the boys when they were young and we had annual passes. We had family Christmas pictures that were taken there. The rides and places are all filled with meaning and memories.

Disneyland can, in some way represents what we all want, “if only…” But the things of this world are there to point us beyond. Beyond Tomorrowland. There is a problem however. If there is no beyond Tomorrowland, and we are left with just the good feelings of Frontierland, and whatever we can do in Adventureland with some Fantasyland thrown in, what do we have? We can take ten trips through “It’s a Small World” and get that song stuck in our head, but will that solve what we witness in the injustices found in our world? 

The Disney experience is just an act. But we can begin to think it’s real, and even hope that it’s real. The summer after my sixth-grade year in school, my friend Steve was going to Disneyland with his family (he was the first person I knew personally that went there). When my friend Steve returned, he told me all about how great it was, but then he said, “Everything there runs on a track.” That stuck with me. We can order everything, and plan everything. Through urban planning we can seek to create a type of utopia. And then we begin to desire, and try to orchestrate things so everything we do in life has to have an experience attached to it. We gauge and measure what we do with how it made us feel, and what the experience was like. One person labeled it as the “Disnification” of life.

One think I notice as I wonder down Main Street is, there is no church or even a church facade there. Here’s my question: What Main Street USA doesn’t have a church building on Main Street? (I know Disney probably did not do that intentionally. It’s not that Disneyland needs a church, but, I see a message in that for our “Main Streets.” If we are left with no church and no Jesus, then it is just up to what we can do and accomplish while here.

In the book of Revelation we are given a description of THE Happiest Place. It’s the new heaven and new earth. It’s back to the Garden (“Eden 2.0”), perfect and restored in a new way. It’s described by what’s not there—the stuff that makes this world a not-so-happy place. Jesus Christ, not Walt Disney, has a Kingdom that has no comparison. It’s all laid out. It was planned and designed for all of us. The admission price was already paid in advance for us, at a great sacrifice. There are themes that we can experience. There are stories of the frontier and the pioneers that blazed the trail and handed down the message with courage, bravery and faith. There is adventure in things to do and places to go. It’s more than just fantasy, but a vision and dream of what will be. We can look, not just to tomorrow, but beyond tomorrow.

There is a solution to what we cannot fix—the broken stuff we see and experience in this world that makes it not always happy. There is a freedom that takes us beyond rails and tracks. We do need Jesus Christ on Main Street. We need the Church on Main Street. It directs us home.

Revelation 7:9, says, “After this I looked and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe and people and language, standing before the throne and in front of the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands.” It’s in that context we can sing “It’s a small world.” We are told in Revelation 21, “He will wipe away every tear from their eyes,” and, “I am making everything new.” We, as Christians are citizens of THE happiest place.

Disneyland has ambassadors. We are ambassadors of the Kingdom of God, and we have been chosen and appointed. It’s Who, and What we represent. We have been given the ministry of reconciliation. We are ambassadors of the peace that comes through Christ. May Jesus Christ, the ruler of the Kingdom we represent, love through us this week, and may we bring a real kind of happiness to the world.

It’s great traveling with you. Blessings.