I get pretty excited when I learn a new word. In my myriad of reading last week, I ran across the word serotiny. Serontiny is a word used in botany meaning “following” or “later”. I know, not so thrilling at first glance but I looked a little bit deeper into the context of the word and discovered a fascinating fact about certain pine trees. Many species of pine trees in prevalent fire zones have adapted over time by producing serontinous pinecones. Those cones can hang on a tree for years, long after all the seeds inside have matured. A strong resin surrounds the cone that will only break open when exposed to the extreme heat of a forest fire. Basically the cone full of seeds is protected until the fire has passed and releases the new seed.
Reading about that got me excited. No, I am not a botanist or an arborist, nor am I particularly scientifically minded. I am a seeker and lover of Jesus Christ and His revelations of Himself He offers us in the world we live in. In that little nugget of new information I saw myself. I saw all of us. We, too, are somewhat serontinous in nature.
Before I get into all of that, let me make it quite clear that I am in no way entertaining the idea of evolution. Pine trees have no will, no mind, no heart to try and change their own circumstances. But the Infinite Creator, who sees all and knows all, built adaptability into the foundational structure of His creation. In other words, He is life and all that He has created is meant to bring Him glory and renown. The glory and renown from little serontinous pinecones?…… He brings life from death. He brings beauty from ashes. That is some mighty fine glory!
Upon completion of my little word study, the Holy Spirit immediately took me to the book of Isaiah, chapter 48, verse 10NIV, “See, I have refined you, though not as silver; I have tested you in the furnace of affliction.” Silver comes out of the ground unrefined and quite unremarkable. The only way to remove the impurities is to place the silver ore in an extremely hot fire where the heat makes the dross, the impurities, rise to the surface of the ore to be scraped off.
No one likes to think about affliction, devastation, trials, problems, or struggles. We would like to avoid them at all costs (right there with you all on that one). The hard truth we all know though is that we can run, but we can’t hide (at least for very long). Troubles will come. And when they do, we will stand at a crossroad each and every time. We can run, fight, and blame God or we can turn the other way and fall breathlessly into His arms as He lovingly and tenderly places us in the fire. Right before we choose, we often linger, hoping for option three…. the one where God takes care of everything with no cost and no growth for us. We would much prefer those big ol’ seed pods of growth and life to just remain hanging in our branches and never be activated. We want comfort. We will take average over extraordinary just to avoid the flames.
His love is too pure, too extravagant, and too fiery to ever leave us unfinished. He yearns for us to become. The fire He chooses for us is not the afflictions and the troubles and the pain. The fire is His love. All the struggles and heartache is the furnace – “furnace of affliction”, not “fire of affliction”. This fallen world we live in is the furnace. His love/His fire is the purifier that removes the imperfections.
The dilemma is the same for all of us. I found myself in one of those difficult places the last couple of days. I was uncomfortable in the furnace but as He always does, He waited until I was ready for the fire. We have to choose it. We have to yield to it. I hid. I struggled. And then I yielded and His love is so boundless that He turned up the heat quickly and burned the dross away (and I didn’t even have to walk through it alone).
That in itself is all quite miraculous but not only does our Lord desire to burn away the things that are hurting us and choking the life out of us, He then bursts open seed pods of new life and growth that will take root and flourish in us.
He will never push you into the white hot fire. He won’t guilt you into it or scare you into it or trick you into it. He will only invite. Over and over and over and over, and then over and over again. You won’t be left behind unless you want to be left behind. Choose to let Him love you to life and watch new possibilities burst forth all around you.