Thanking Trees

During the summer months we worship at a small Congregational church in a nearby town. The congregation worships outside the church building in what they call “the meadow.” It is a shady spot overshadowed by tall pines. These evergreens stand like guardians around a ”peace pole” on which a message of peace is written in several languages. It is a lovely spot for worship.  

I love to worship outdoors. When I served as a pastor, I used every excuse to get my congregation out of the church building and into a natural setting. While here in New Hampshire that included preaching from Pulpit Rock in our corner of the White Mountain National Park, picnics & worship by the pond behind the church, leading worship for fairgoers on an outdoor stage during Columbus Day weekend, baptisms in the lake, a live nativity service at Christmastime, Christmas caroling around the village, Easter sunrise services, and Blessing of the Animals. 

A season never went by without finding an opportunity to get outside the church building to worship. Not only do these outdoor services serve people who might not step inside a church building, but it inspires regular churchgoers to connect the gospel to the world outside the church walls.  

There is something uniquely inspiring about worshipping in a natural setting. God feels closer. God speaks powerfully through Nature, usually more powerfully than through human words. For these reasons I now cherish opportunities for outdoor worship, whether they be at this Congregational church or the Episcopal services held on Church Island during the summer, which we try to attend at least once a year.  

Recently we received some bad news from the Congregational pastor. The four pine trees, which surround the peace pole and shade us during summer worship, are infested with pine borers. They are dying and are going to be removed this month. In her weekly email to the congregation she invited people to “stop by the trees in the next week or two and give them thanks for graceful shade and faithful companionship over many years.” 

So my wife and I did just that. On our way home from the grocery store, we stopped by and thanked the trees. The following day I returned to take a photo of the trees, which I will include here. I thanked the trees for shading us from the summer heat. I thanked them for hosting birds, which would worship with us regularly and occasionally join their voices with ours. The trees inspired us by tirelessly spreading their arms in praise to their Source, which is also our Source.  

They lead us in lifting our hearts to heaven. Trees are so much better at worship than humans are! They are also much better at silence. They are better at teaching and sermonizing eternal truths. Endless homilies are proclaimed wordlessly by these silent sentinels. They are better at living than we are, and they are better at dying. Trees have a lot to teach us if we have ears to hear.  

These four trees have been faithful members of the congregation for many years, and now they are dying. Next spring the congregation will decide what type of trees will be planted in their place. But we all know that it will be decades before the young trees can provide the type of shade that their forebears provided. By that time nearly all (if not all) of the congregation will be gone as well. These old trees will be old memories in historical photographs. 

So, thank you pines! You have performed your ministry well. I miss you already. While I am thinking about it, I also want to thank the trees that sit as cordwood in my backyard, visible to me as I sit on my back porch writing this on my laptop. That firewood will keep me warm this winter. I thank the trees that provided the lumber for my raised flower bed, which I just constructed yesterday. I thank the trees that provided the wood for my old house over two hundred years ago.  

So many trees to be thankful for! So much to be thankful to trees for! Thank you, trees, for the beautiful autumn foliage that is decorating my yard. Thank you for pumping out the oxygen that my lungs breathe in. Thank you for protecting the ground from erosion. Thank you, thank you, thank you for being faithful ambassadors of God. May I do half as well during my earthly pilgrimage.