Aspens........ Until living here I was not always so impressed by the aspen tree. But seeing them in every season and learning about them, I have come to love them. Unlike most deciduous trees they are interconnected by a root system that spreads out and creates other aspens by sending out shoots. This helps them to survive and continue on. Even after a fire, due to the fact that the root system survives the heat, aspen colonies will reappear with the roots sending forth more shoots. They can be fragile as individuals subject to disease and other ailments causing the one tree to die but because of its connection to the root system, others will take its place continuing on the colony.......Are we not in the kingdom of Heaven called to be sort of the same? "Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others." Romans 12:4-5

Aspens are tender green in the spring with a green that defies description. The white trunks with their dark spots called eyes due to their shape reflect the sun when they are hit by its light in all seasons. Their leaves quake in the wind sounding like little fairy hands clapping. In the Fall they turn either a bright yellow-gold or a peachy orange depending on the species; their Fall beauty takes my breath away. Should not the Kingdom of Heaven do the same in the midst of a world in turmoil; our every breath, our every season, our every sound calling out to the world, "come home, come to the One who offers peace that transcends all understanding?"

So as I sit in the midst of the aspens, or sometimes I even lie down among them looking through their leaves heavenward, my prayer is that I can be a citizen of hope and peace in the middle of the Kingdom of Heaven.