SNMOC - A Word for the Day: Of the Importance of Roots...

 There once was a husbandman who decided one day to plant some trees upon his property. He took young and healthy saplings and planted them on his property. The soil where he planted them was rich and fertile and in the southernmost parts of his fields where there was ample light and frequent irrigation from the rains that would come.


In time, these trees grew into big and strong maples providing verdant foliage and abundant shade in the heat of the day. Many of the maples formed deep and massive roots that anchored them well into the soil, even down as far as the bedrock. However, some of the trees laid down only shallow, smaller roots that spread out far around them but had no depth.


When in time, the heavy thunderstorms came; the deeply rooted trees swayed to and fro in the winds and even lost some of their leaves, but they remained firmly rooted to the good earth and hence, they survived. The others with the shallow smaller roots were not as fortunate. They swayed to and fro in the winds as well but were eventually uprooted and blown away with the storms. Even though their roots extended out farther around them, they had no depth and were not anchored to the good soil beneath them.


Dear ones... Let us be as the trees with deep roots anchored firmly to the solid foundation of the Christian Faith. We have a fertile home of abundance if we would persevere and send our roots deep into the Faith as it was once delivered for all time. Let us not expend our time looking here and there and sending smaller, more tentative roots out towards alternatives and unproven havens. The sure foundation of the Orthodox Church is the safe harbor of our salvation in Jesus Christ. Let us cling to the bedrock of our salvation.



Benedict+