Old Growth

“The unseen root clings cramplike unto Thee.”

           ~George MacDonald

Scripture: Romans 5:1–4

Bristlecone pines are the world’s oldest living things, hence the scientific name, pinus longaeva, “ancient pine.” Several trees three to four thousand years old have been discovered, and in 1957 dendrochronologist Edmund Schulman found one he named Methuselah, an ancient, gnarled pine almost five thousand years old! Methuselah was an old tree when the Egyptians were building the pyramids.

Bristlecones grow atop the mountains of the Great Basin from Wheeler Peak, on Nevada’s eastern border, to the White-Inyo mountain range of California [1] at elevations of 10,000 to 11,000 feet and have adapted to some of the harshest living conditions on earth—arctic temperatures; fierce, desiccating winds; limited oxygen; and very little rainfall.

The brutal environment in which these trees live is the reason why they’ve survived for millennia. Some of the oldest and healthiest of the trees are isolated, solitary sentinels exposed to the most extreme conditions. Adversity has made them resilient and strong.

Bristlecones know something we’ve forgotten: Hardship makes for extraordinary strength and staying power. 

We decry the parents who raised us or rail at present indignity and misery, yet adversity is part of the good God has promised to do for us. Trouble, if it turns us to God, ceases to be evil. It becomes the best thing that could happen to us.

So we should pray, not for the relief of our affliction, but for the grace to turn it into greater openness to God and to His will for us. That’s the point of earthly life and the point of all our suffering.

Accepted as part of God’s will, difficulty delivers us from the necessities that ordinary men and women cannot do without. It purifies us from our earthly attachments and pride. It liberates us from ambition and the desire for earthly prestige and power. It “digs in us a deeper place for God’s grace to fill,” as a beleaguered friend of mine once said, and leaves us wholly dependent upon God’s love alone. Thus we acquire extraordinary strength and endurance that others never achieve.

That’s why Paul entreats us to rejoice in adversity, “knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character . . .” (Romans 5:3, 4). We must dig deep in the hard times, with unseen roots clinging “cramplike” to God. Thus we can be strong in calamity, at peace in the place where God has planted us. “I’ve not seen a discontented tree,” John Muir said.

[1] After I wrote this piece, a forester informed me that Bristlecones occur in Idaho but are not as hardy or as long-lived as the White Mountain variety because the environment in which they’re found is less extreme.

One Response to “Old Growth”

1. MJCoombes says:

   October 22, 2009 at 4:44 am

   A very good article, excellent for those of us who have experienced the digging in our hearts that makes room for God’s grace to fill. That’s a true comment, worth remembering. Good article, too, for those of us who collect facts for illustrations as we connect with saved or unsaved people. With brothers and sisters in Christ, who may be suffering, I talk about the cedars of Lebanon. But I’m going to add the Bristleccone to my store. Thanks again for the article.