Reflecting His Light

We had a huge ice-storm yesterday..sleet, freezing rain...it was so COLD.

We don't have any trees in our backyard. Thankfully, because my husband turns into a maniac when it comes to leaves in the pool. Instead of covering the pool in the fall and winter, like a normal, rational person, he likes to keep it open all year. He enjoys looking at the water year-round...and it is pretty...but that means leaves will get in it.

I feel like at this point I'm just stating the obvious.

One of our neighbors has a tree with branches that hang over into our backyard. Jim goes NUTS when leaves from it blow into the pool. He acts like it's a personal attack on our property, instead of a normal that's-what-wind-does-to-leaves-on-trees-in-the-fall type of thing.

Honestly, I would love to have some trees and shrubs in the back yard...along the back fence. Even some landscaping back there would be nice. But, alas...the LEAVES.

Jim is not really crazy. He knows we are laughing at with him. We can see him through the windows...emptying the skimmers and then getting the long net and trying to get every.single.leaf out of the water. And, like clock-work, he'll come in the house and look out the window and say, "dang...another leaf in the pool."

COVER THE POOL ALREADY.

But I started this post to talk about the TREE. The one in our neighbor's yard.

Yesterday, as the sleet and freezing rain fell, I watched the branches of this tree get lower and lower. I wish I had taken pictures of it every hour...kind of like a time-lapsed photography project...but I didn't. The main reason I was watching it was because I was afraid one of the branches was going to break off and fall on our fence.

None did, but it may be just a matter of time. This morning, it is VERY windy. I can see it whipping the tree around. As the sun melts the ice, and the wind blows...pieces of ice are falling from the tree.

But that's not what made me look out the window. What made me look out the window was the strange glow coming from outside. It was the SUN! Why, hello there!

And then I saw the most beautiful sight: the sun was shining on that big tree and it was magical. The limbs were frozen and heavy. The reflection of the sun's rays on the limbs made it sparkle like a tree from the movie, "Frozen." I wish I could describe it with words. Here was a normal-looking, albeit annoying tree (according to Jim), but today it was breathtaking.

I stared at it for several minutes. Even now, sitting here, I keep pulling back the curtain to see...because God was stirring my heart...teaching me...

...that without the sun, the tree wouldn't reflect the light.

...that without the SON, we wouldn't reflect HIS Light...that is Christ in us.

...that sometimes the world is cold and hard...and the weight of it makes us stoop and bow low.

...that when the wind blows in those hard seasons of life, we sometimes lose part of ourselves. We can get battered. Broken, even.

...that in those times, stooped low and tossed about...the SON comes and we reflect His presence.

...that maybe we are at our strongest when the winds of adversity blow...because it forces our roots to go deeper.

And that we are at our most beautiful when we reflect His light.

"O LORD, our Lord, Your majestic name fills the earth! Your glory is higher than the heavens." Proverbs 8:2