A Leaf in the Stream

During my first year as a pastor, God showed me something that has helped me understand my place in what he’s doing in the world. It’s an image that I keep going back to, and I hope it’s one that you’ll find helpful as well.

I was the pastor of two churches in Armstrong County, and it was one of those weeks that pastors sometimes have. Nothing at the churches seemed to be going right, and people were pointing fingers at each other, and at me. I felt overwhelmed by the task in front of me, and I was frustrated by the difficulties that had cropped up. To clear my head and to seek God’s direction, I went for a walk in the woods. It was the fall, and I eventually ended up beside a little stream. As I stood there, stewing in my juices, my attention was drawn to a leaf floating down the stream: bouncing off the rocks, hurling over a little waterfall, getting caught in an eddy, and eventually floating downstream.

And then it hit me. Or, to word it more accurately, I realized what God was trying to tell me. He is the stream, and I am the leaf. I am caught up in something much larger than myself. Just as the current of the stream carried the leaf along, God’s Spirit carries me along in his plan. The leaf isn’t going to get downstream faster by doing anything on its own. The stream is in control of where it’s going, and God is in control of where I’m going and what I’m doing. The leaf has no idea where it’s going, or why it’s going there. But that doesn’t matter; it doesn’t need to. The stream will take care of things.

I am caught up in something bigger than me. It doesn’t all depend upon me to make things work out. God has a plan that is unfolding and carrying me along. I may not understand it, and I may not see where it is taking me. And that’s OK. I can relax in the stream that is carrying me along, and know that God is in control of it.

This image of being a leaf in the stream of God’s Spirit came to me again about three years ago, when I was devastated by the news that I would have to start work all over again on my PhD dissertation. Once again, I found myself standing beside a creek, watching the leaves float downstream. But this time, some of the leaves had ended up in a patch of still water away from the current of the stream. These leaves, for some reason, had ended up in a backwater that kept them from moving along. And I realized that, for reasons unknown to me, God wanted me to remain in the place where I was for a time before moving on. He wanted me to spend another year earning my degree.

Some people may be tempted to view this image as an excuse to be lazy and passive. Like an inert leaf, we just allow God to do his thing while we sit back and do nothing. But that’s not the message I’ve received. For me, it is a source of peace and hope. When I’m tempted to get anxious about how things are going, and to fret about the things I need to do in order to move things along, the image of a leaf in the stream reminds me of the truth. I am caught up in something bigger than me. God has a plan that is carrying me along. And I can trust him to carry me to his goal.