Leaf Lessons
When I was in 7th grade, I wrote an article for our school newspaper about why leaves change color in the fall.
Yes, I was THAT cool a kid.
It was back when we had to type our articles in the computer lab, cut and glue them in columns on a new sheet of paper with our classmates’ pieces and then have the teacher make copies to distribute. I think my article got marked up for some inaccuracies because the newspaper coach was also the science teacher, but even then, I was fascinated by the changes that happen in the fall.
This fall, the colors have been especially gorgeous. Late fall rains and warm days have made our maples morph into burning bushes.
But, news articles, these coming far more rapidly than my 7th grade- reporter-self could have ever imagined, have left me feeling brittle and a little rotten.
Mid-term elections have made the whole country feel off-kilter, again, if we ever managed to get our balance after years of pandemic and political upheaval.
Contentious school board meetings have made me feel nauseated and helpless, watching as educators get caught in the cross-fire of cultural wars and a straining social system, as parents and community members have turned against each other with angry rhetoric and callous distrust.
And I can’t clear this darn teacher wish list from teachers at my kids’ school.
A friend of ours found a “knot” on his neck and had it biopsied today because it appears to be cancer. He’s the same age as my husband.
My friend’s foster sons can’t get into appointments because Medicaid takes forever and their parents don’t show up to visitations.
Kyiv keeps burning.
There’s not enough rice at the food pantry for us to put it in the bags at the Backpack Program each week.
Even good things like dreaming about what our church could do in connecting with neighbors on Tuesday nights feel complicated, leaving me wrestling with how to sustainably be good neighbors on Kelley St while also loving the neighbors on my own—and my own children.
Sometimes, I resonate deeply with JJ Heller’s song, “You Keep Your Promises,” when she sings,
“Everyone I care for
Just like every perfect dream
Withers, fades, and drifts away
Feels like we're all falling with the leaves”
Pastor Matthew invited us this week to share our big questions with Jesus and to tell about it. I’m borrowing my questions from Scripture:
“Why does the way of the wicked prosper?
Why do all the treacherous thrive?
2 You planted them, so they have taken root.
They are growing, bearing fruit.
You are near in their mouth,
yet far from their mind...
4 How long will the land mourn
and the grass of all the field wither?”
“7 Why do the wicked live on,
growing old and increasing in power?
13 They spend their years in prosperity
and go down to the grave in peace.
14 Yet they say to God, ‘Leave us alone!
We have no desire to know your ways...
23 One person dies in full vigor,
completely secure and at ease,
24 well nourished in body,
bones rich with marrow.
25 Another dies in bitterness of soul,
never having enjoyed anything good.
26 Side by side they lie in the dust,
and worms cover them both...
31 Who denounces their conduct to their face?
Who repays them for what they have done?
32 They are carried to the grave,
and watch is kept over their tombs.
33 The soil in the valley is sweet to them;
everyone follows after them,
and a countless throng goes before them.
34 “So how can you console me with your nonsense? ”
So, I’m back to looking at these changing leaves.
The U.S. Forest Service explains that leaves change color in the fall because, “During the growing season, chlorophyll is continually being produced and broken down and leaves appear green. As night length increases in the autumn, chlorophyll production slows down and then stops and eventually all the chlorophyll is destroyed. The carotenoids and anthocyanin that are present in the leaf are then unmasked and show their colors.”
The beauty, the glory has been there through the growing. It has always been there. It’s only unmasked, revealed, allowed to shine when the night gets longer and the days get colder.
Then, “Plants drop their leaves in a controlled fashion to reduce injuries and conserve energy.”
Grow then go slow when it gets dark. Allow true colors to emerge. Surrender to fragility and finitude to avoid injury and protect energy. Fall in a heap of others instead of hanging on or descending alone.
Lessons for resilience have been spinning through the air this fall and fluttering over our heads.
Grow-Bonnie Myotai Treace says, “Rage — whether in reaction to social injustice, or to our leaders’ insanity, or to those who threaten or harm us — is a powerful energy that, with diligent practice, can be transformed into fierce compassion.”
Go Slow When It Gets Dark- In Psalm 131, David, comes to rest.“I have calmed and quieted myself, I am like a weaned child with its mother; like a weaned child I am content.” Just as we get cozier as the dark nights creep closer, we can stop striving and collapse against a God who understands. God sees.
One of my favorite songs is “Your Labor is Not in Vain” from the Porter’s Gate. It helps me to find peace:
“Your labor is not unknown
though the rocks they cry out and the sea it may groan.
The place of your toil may not seem like a home
but your labor is not unknown…
The vineyards you plant will bear fruit
the fields will sing out and rejoice with the truth,
for all that is old will at last be made new:
the vineyards you plant will bear fruit.
Allow True Colors to Emerge- When these leaves are experiencing the most loss, they also show their most glorious true essences. True colors exist under the surface. This goes for in what has always been inside of us, the image of God that is full of persistence, perspective, playfulness, presence and patience. It also goes for those with whom we are disillusioned or angry. I remember hearing theologian Christena Cleveland once say that before she meets with someone she knows will be especially combative, she says internally, “The image of God in me greets the image of God in _____,” as a way to remember the humanity and divine color that’s always there but sometimes obscured.
Surrender to fragility and finitude to avoid injury and protect energy- Just as trees have to allow their leaves to finish up and fall, have to seal up connections that once lead to life, and must become bare and exposed, if we are going to spread the good news of God’s reign on earth, we’ll have to surrender. We’ll have to accept that we can’t do it all, that there are seasons where we can engage with great capacity and seasons when we can just rest and receive. I tend to want to clench all the leaves to my chest, not wanting any to fall and savoring the chaotic beauty of being involved in so many ways. However, the failure to let go means I can be more easily weighed down or even have unhealthy patterns that can “overwinter” without a time of reflection and rest.
Fall in a Heap (and allow changes to be reaped)- When I was sharing yesterday with another daughter of an immigrant about how hard it is to keep going when so many things need to be righted, we got to talking about our abuelas and lolas. She reminded me that we can draw on stories of generations of women and those on the margins who’ve endured, organized, advocated, resisted, and prayed (groaned) for justice.
Which reminds me of Christena Cleveland, again. In her article “Wellness in the Age of Trump and Terror,” she explains to those of us just waking up to how broken our world and systems:
“Many of us feel compelled to act – to speak out, to protest, to advocate, to gather, to comfort, to fight for justice. But for many, particularly white people, this is the first time they have attempted to act effectively under duress and anxiety. This is the first time that the oppression feels personal to them and they don’t know what to do. For others, particularly people of color, this is yet another trauma on top of a lifetime of traumas. Many of us have been fighting for years. We’ve reached our physical limits and we’re weary. No matter the reason or racial identity, many who feel compelled to fight for justice find themselves deterred by listlessness, hopelessness, perplexity and fear. Me too.
Clergy and other community leaders often ask me what they need to do in order to fight for justice. My response is always the same: we must all start by being formed for justice leadership. We can’t keep fighting, absorbing and healing from traumas, and hoping in the face of disappointment without a fortified and formed spirituality that directly speaks to the issues of injustice. The beautiful thing about our current blatantly-unjust political climate is that it is a holy ground for this type of spiritual formation. We are formed, fortified and even reborn in the liminal spaces and during the shadowy times.”
We cannot hope, dream, and work for God’s kingdom to come on earth without the strength of others (especially those on the margins or who have lived experience with being faithful amidst injustice) and without being deeply formed as followers of Jesus. Our belovedness and belonging are what allow us to “not grow weary doing good.” What might seem like it’s accomplishing nothing over months of deconstruction or what looks messy is actually doing what leaves are supposed to do: enrich the soil for a new season of growing.
Temperatures might fool us but the light doesn’t lie. We all have to find ways to live together and through times of lengthening darkness.
May we flame with what has always been within us. May we allow Jesus to lead us through cycles of growth and loss and rest. May we find ways to gather together and become what our communities need in the future.
