Christmas 2000 Ice Storm

More Rosedale Community, LeFlore Cty Oklahoma ice storm pics
Roger Hendrix scanned these photos taken by Steve Hendrix

It was a humbling site to see great trees bowed to the ground as their limbs were heavy with ice. Perhaps the thing that makes these scenes so troubling is that we recognize ourselves in the image of the trees. So often we allow the weight of the world to bend and break us. But though these trees were bent, many of them were not broken.

We've all heard the old adage, "Bloom where you are planted." Trees were scarred, limbs lost from their winter battle. But this past spring many of them still bloomed where their Creator had planted them.

The ice melted. Even in the midst of destruction, these trees maintained their golden glow. It was almost as if they were saying, "You can wound me but you can't destroy my spirit. You can't destroy who I am."

Maybe it's easier for a tree. Because we humans can think and worry, we have too much sense to just trust our Creator the way the trees do. But God gave us a mind to choose. We can choose to let the storms of life break us, or we can choose to look to our Creator.

This is not the first time that a tree has been beautiful in tragedy. In the story of the ages, it was a tree that was chosen to have the most tragic plight of all. A tree became an instrument of death for the Creator. Yet it was by that tree that the Creator rescued his creation. That story still helps humans find beauty in tragedy today.

Click here to see page one of these photos from the Rosedale Community.

For more December 2000 ice storm stories and photos, click here.

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