I took this photo on a recent day out in the lovely English countryside. The four of us had just taken a ride on a real steam engine in Leighton Buzzard Railway, and as it was a sunny spring afternoon, the warmest day of the year thus far in Britain, we decided to treat ourselves to some ice cream.So out came the picnic mat (which is always, ALWAYS stored in the boot, just in case) and we all kicked off our shoes, sprawled out over the grass and happily enjoyed our ice cream in the shade of a large tree.
As I lay with my boys under its widespread branches, wondering how old this tree was and feeling drowsy in the uncommon warmth, my eyes looked up and saw this: new leaves, freshly unfurled, bright green and alive with anticipation. And these leaves sprang out from the old gnarled branches of the old gnarled tree, with its lined, weather-beaten bark encasing a rough and sturdy trunk. The contrast was breathtaking, and led me to reflect...
This is my second spring in England, and inasmuch as my first UK spring meant, for the most part, that I had triumphantly survived my first UK winter, this year is different for me somehow. I now find myself looking around me, seeing the daffodils, tulips and cornflowers bloom, as if for the first time. I look at my favourite trees on my daily walk, and appreciate what the seasons mean for them. I have seen them everyday, all year long. I have lost count of all the different shades of green that I see in our garden in just a single day. Now I see what spring is like.
For a girl brought up in a tropical, wet-and-wetter country, living out the four seasons of a year has been a tremendous learning experience. It still is. Reading about spring, summer, autumn and winter in books is sooooo different from actually feeling it happening around you, seeing how nature responds to the changes of the seasons. I marvel at all these changes as a bystander, an observer, all the while thinking of home, and how strange and un-home all THIS still is to me.
So on that day in Leighton Buzzard, as I looked up and saw this old English tree unfurling this year's new leaves from the same branches it has had since its youth, I had a startling thought: Nette, this could be you.
Me? Warm, sunny, tropical, sampaloc-tree me? Like this aloof, unfamiliar, temperate region tree? How so?, I asked myself.
Like this tree, I reflected, I sometimes look and feel the weight of years gone by. Mistakes, regrets, ghosts of past wrongs. This tree has stood and seen much throughout its life, and yet, each autumn it sheds its old leaves and grows new ones in spring. No matter what has happened in its past, it always faces forward with hope, it anticipates its renewal, year in and year out, as Mother Nature strips away the unbecoming brown and replaces it with young green.
There stands hope, and there stands renewal.
Have you ever seen a new leaf growing on an old tree? If you have only ever lived in a two-season place, probably not. I know that the only time I ever saw new leaves back home was on young trees and saplings, and in MetroManila pollution, even they didn't stay fresh and untainted for very long.
So I looked at this tree above me, and I looked in particular at its leaves. The lines of the leaves were clean, each leaf fluttered in the breeze, untouched by anything except the wind, the sun and the rain. No unsightly folds, no gashes, no marks on its surface. Just smooth, clean lines on a smooth, clean green. On each leaf an intricate pattern of life and of hope.
No wonder, then, that the word "lent" means "spring." Each Lent, we become like that tree. Our old and withered branches-- tired and drooping from years of work, study, sadness, pain-- are suddenly covered with new leaves of untouched purity, bringing fresh life, fresh hope, fresh joy, fresh expectation. Each Lent, our Lord renews us and makes us young again, taking away the past, wiping the slate clean, giving us a fresh start, a chance to once again begin.
Like many of you, I am in constant need to be reminded of that; I need to re-discover the grace of God, the gift of new beginnings.
And on that particular spring day, it only took a tree to remind me of the love of God for me: fresh but unchanging, firm but forgiving, wise and ancient, full of hope and surprises.
So when I feel tired, old, hopeless, bogged down by guilt, sin, rejection or failure, I simply think of that tree, and my heart lightens.
And sometimes, you know, when I keep very very still, I can almost feel the fresh springtime breeze of the Spirit, playfully ruffling the young, green leaves of my weary soul, making them dance.
