In June, my son and I got to go on a backpacking adventure along the coastline of northern California. On the drive down to our starting point, we got to stop in an old growth Redwood grove outside of Crescent City for lunch. A posted sign told us that the oldest tree in the grove was well over 2,000 years old! Standing next to something that big that has been alive on this earth for that long had a way of putting my small human life into perspective. I found the experience of my smallness and the tree’s largeness strangely grounding. It was both awe inspiring and comforting to experience the cool shade and woody smells that originated from a seed that germinated and took root in this spot in the dirt even before Jesus Christ walked the earth. It calmed my restless spirit to know that it had been growing ever since. Through all the wars, explorations, colonizing, empires, fires, earthquakes, and technological advances of the last two millennia, this tree had found enough water, sunlight, nutrients, oxygen and space to keep living and keep growing.
As we packed up our lunch stuff and left the grove that afternoon, I wondered to myself why something that made me feel so small could also make me feel so secure and at peace within myself. I think it is because the tree put me in my place; the place God intended for me all along as a human being. Touching the bark layers of a 2,000-year-old organism dissolved some of the unspoken (and unnatural) desires and expectations for grandiosity, transcendence and influence that I cling to for dear life, burdens which God never intended for me or anybody else to carry. Somehow, that simple encounter with the tree helped to redirect my attention from all the things I was not doing by being gone on this trip, to being truly present with my son and God’s wild creation for the remainder of our time together.
The wisdom that this tree bark spoke to me that afternoon echoes the wisdom spoken by the writer of Ecclesiastes. Ecclesiastes 2:24-26 in the NIV translation says this:
A person can do nothing better than to eat and drink and find satisfaction in their own toil. This too, I see, is from the hand of God, for without him, who can eat or find enjoyment? To the person who pleases him, God gives wisdom, knowledge and happiness, but to the sinner he gives the task of gathering and storing up wealth to hand it over to the one who pleases God. This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind.
The word that the NIV translates as “meaningless” is the Hebrew word hebel. It literally means “mist” or “vapor.” It is like foggy breath on a cold day that disappears in just a few seconds. This is a very important word in the Book of Ecclesiastes, and translating the word as “meaningless” makes many of the passages in Ecclesiastes take on a very different meaning than what I think was likely intended by the author. The writer was not intending to convey the idea that life is pointless and without meaning, but that life is short and fleeting. The writer is trying to put human beings in their place (their God-given place!), by confronting them with the reality of the shortness of life “under the sun” and the fact that there is much about life (including the number of our years, our legacy, and our wealth) that we cannot control, and so it’s best to receive it all as a gracious gift from God.
In reminding the wise reader of the fleetingness and shortness of human life, the writer is not intending to be a downer, but a reality check that encourages one to bask in and savor the simple pleasures of life – things like a hard day’s work, a loving spouse, friendship, laughter, yummy food and drink, and a good night’s sleep.
In his book, How to Inhabit Time, James K. A. Smith summarizes the wisdom that the author of Ecclesiastes gives us in the face of our not so human desires to want to transcend or control history and bend it to our will:
“This is not a counsel of despair or resignation but rather an invitation to reframe expectations so that I can ‘enjoy’ what’s before me, who is with me, fleeting as their presence might be. The question isn’t whether we can escape this condition but how we will receive our mortality, how we will shepherd what’s fleeting yet given.”(1)
That’s what that old Redwood tree was helping me to remember- to consider my mortality in a good way so that I would shepherd the misty moments right in front of me as a wonderful and precious gift from our Creator.
(1) James K. A. Smith, How to Inhabit Time: Understanding the Past, Facing the Future, Living Faithfully Now (Grand Rapids: Brazos Press, 2022), 103.
About the Author
Aaron is a passionate seeker of God and truth, and he enjoys encouraging others in their own pursuits of the same. He especially likes to think about how God is at work in the most ordinary and mundane aspects of our existence. He loves going on adventures to new places with his wife, Heather, and four kids and his perfect day would involve an excellent cup of coffee (or two!), a hike to somewhere beautiful and serene, and some good conversation over a pint at a warm pub. He currently serves as an adjunct instructor at Portland Seminary and co-leads the CitySalt Kids’ Ministry along with his wife, Heather.