Do you know what deciduous means?
“Falling off at maturity,” and ” falling away (of a part) after its purpose is fulfilled.
We admire beautiful buds bursting into bloom during spring. We appreciate the shade of green leaves on a hot summer day. We bask in the bounty of color during autumns’ glory. In short, we praise production of plants. We admire them most in their heyday.
After the blooms have fallen away, the lack of color, the lack of texture, the lack of well, anything, causes us to cast aside our notice. However, this dormancy protects deciduous plants from extreme winter weather.
Our souls are a lot like deciduous trees.
We can pour ourselves out in producing spiritual fruit, blooming vivaciously in the scorching sun. Never saying ‘no’, we might fully appreciate the praise of how much we get done. We like our lives to inspire growth. We like our lives to protect our loved ones. We like our lives to look pretty.
We don’t want our lives to be simply bare stems.
But like trees, we need to know when to stop attempting to produce fruit and when to give our souls a break.
That breaks included being held and rejuvenated by our Heavenly Father. Allowing our spiritual and emotional roots to grow deep within the fertile soil of His word, and nourished by the Holy Spirit so we can produce fruit once again.
A tree doesn’t grow perfect pears when the bark is peeling and the limbs are droopy. Neither do we produce favorable fruit when we are weary and exhausted.
The challenge with humanity is that we often tune out our spiritual barometer and instead of slowing down when the mercury drops, preparing for a rest, we often try to kick ourselves into high gear!
Like deciduous trees, God designed us to need rest. (Exodus 34:21) We need time away from producing fruit. We need to accurately sense our internal spiritual gauges, resting when energy is low so we are not caught in a winter without reserves.
With His guidance we can accurately live our calling while maintaining a full relationship with God.
By deciding to be deciduous, we are preparing our hearts and souls to bloom beautifully in His time.