Title – As a Tree Grows

Author – W. Phillip Keller

Publisher – Charlotte:  Commission Press, 1966

If there is a book out in print that fits perfectly the theme of this blog, it would be this nature work by Keller.  He touches on fourteen topics related to trees:  the cedars of Lebanon, life, water, light, heat, air, weather, fire, space, minerals, humus, perils, darkness, and rest.

He highlights these trees in the Bible:

• The righteous shall flourish like the palm tree: he shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon (Psalms 92:12)
• Blessed is the man that trusteth in the LORD, and whose hope the LORD is.  For he shall be as a tree planted by the waters, and that spreadeth out her roots by the river, and shall not see when heat cometh, but her leaf shall be green; and shall not be careful in the year of drought, neither shall cease from yielding fruit (Jeremiah 17:7-8)
• Praise the LORD from the earth, ye dragons, and all deeps: fire, and hail; snow, and vapours; stormy wind fulfilling his word: mountains, and all hills; fruitful trees, and all cedars (Psalm 148:7-9)
• Open your doors, O Lebanon, that the fire may devour your cedars!  Wail, O fir tree and cypress, for the cedar has fallen; because the glorious and lofty trees are laid waste!  Wail, O you oaks of Bashan, for the thick and inaccessible forest [on the steep mountain side] has in flames been felled (Zechariah 11:1-2, Amplified)
• I will bring healing to their crushed spirits; in free mercy I will give them back my love; my vengeance has passed them by.  I will be morning dew, to make Israel grow as the lilies grow, strike roots deep as the forest of Lebanon.  Whose branches shall spread, it shall become fair as the olive, fragrant as Lebanon cedar (Hosea 14:4-6, Knox)
• As therefore you have received the Christ, even Jesus our Lord, live and act in vital union with Him; having the roots of your being firmly planted in Him, and continually building yourselves up in Him, and always being increasingly confirmed in the faith as you were taught it, abounding in it with thanksgiving (Colossians 2:6-7, Weymouth)
• And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper (Psalm 1:3)