Chinese Bamboo Tree
Steve Martin
“However, we
want each one of you to keep showing the same diligence right up to the end,
when your hope will be realized; so that you will not become sluggish, but will
be imitators of those who by their trust and patience are receiving what has
been promised.”
Hebrews
6:11-12 CJB
I
first heard the story of the Chinese bamboo tree in the late 1990’s. As the administrator
of All Nations Church in Charlotte, NC, pastored by Mahesh and Bonnie Chavda, others
and myself were anticipating the growth in the church membership. All involved
with the new church plant in this Carolina region, begun in 1994, were working
hard, giving what each had been gifted to do, in leadership, service, and care
for the people.
Mahesh
spoke one Sunday morning, and again at the all-night prayer time that Friday
night following, called the Watch of the Lord, about the Chinese bamboo tree.
It was an encouraging word, both to the church as a group, and to individuals
specifically. Myself included.
In
helping us visualize what can happen in the spiritual, by looking at natural
examples the Lord gives us, Mahesh explained the amazing characteristics of
this particular plant species. He spoke of how it is most often the way the
Lord starts and grows a work that He has initiated. If He birthed it, He will
see that it thrives, as we hear and obey along the way. But the way isn’t what
we always think it will be. Or at least hope it will be.
Briefly,
this particular bamboo, after being planted as a sprout, is watered,
fertilized, watered, fertilized, watered, fertilized, again and again and again.
Year after year. But there is no visible evidence that anything is happening. During
that time, it certainly can be very challenging to one’s faith, especially if
you are the one hauling the water and the fertilizer!
Year one passes. Nothing seen. Year two comes and goes.
Nothing. But yet you remain faithful, believing the unseen will become the
seen.
Year three. “Nada” (as is “nothing” in Spanish.) Year four - “Niet”
(“no” in Russian.) Year five – “klum” (nothing) in Hebrew. But year five!
In a 23 day
period, the Chinese bamboo explodes upward 22 feet into the sky. And in the
short period of six weeks total, it can reach 80 feet! Remarkable! World Book
Encyclopedia records that one bamboo plant can grow three feet in a simple
twenty-four-hour period.
The question is then asked –
did it grow 80 feet in six weeks or 80 feet in five years? I’m saying the
later.
During that five year
period, the root system, unseen, was being developed. Once the time had come to
shoot upwards, the foundation had already been laid. This would then sustain
the height and weight of the full grown tree. In addition to the upward growth,
shoots had been sent out, also below ground level. This multiplication can come
up through the soil up to ten feet away.
What a natural visual for us in the spiritual. Builds your faith, right?
You who have been laboring, faithfully, in the natural, all the time hoping, believing
to see the increase come in the spiritual. Prayer, reading the Lo
You have been waiting. You have been doing. You have been
crying out to the Lord for more results.
The time is coming. For you,
it may be the 5th year now.
God the Father has given us
examples of those who have gone before us – Joseph, David, even Yeshua (Jesus)
Himself. Each had to spend the time needed to first develop the character, before
the time of the release. They then had the capacity for strength, wisdom and
love to hold the weight of the assignment He had for them. As for them, so for
you - that eternal purpose He has for you.
My prayer is that you will
not quit in the third year. That you will keep believing through the fourth
year. And that you will get the reward in that fifth year.
Our God is a faithful God.
His promises are true to you.
Ahava,
Steve Martin
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