Bees in the Tree

My friend Carroll was sharing about bees in the tree.

“I grew up about 40 – 60 miles west of Asheville, NC. One day my friends and I were playing out in the soybean fields. It was after harvest and so the fields were bare except for the stubs of stalks sticking out of the ground.  All of a sudden a part of the sky got dark. We looked up and a swarm of bees was coming toward us. It passed over us and settled in a tree.

“When I got home I told my daddy about it. He said, ‘Come on son,’ and we headed over to a neighbor of ours who was a beekeeper. I took my daddy and our neighbor out to the tree where the bees were, and sure enough they were still there. The neighbor had brought along a hive.

“My daddy looked at me and said, ‘Son, climb on up the tree and shake the limbs and those bees will come down.’

“I said, ‘But daddy, those bees will sting me.’

“He said, ‘No son, those bees won’t sting you. Now you go ahead and climb the tree and shake those branches. It will be alright.’

“I climbed the tree, shook the branches, the bees came down to the ground, and then our neighbor found the queen bee and put her in the hive. As soon as he did that all the other bees followed her into the hive. No one was stung.”

I wonder how many times my heavenly Father has told me to climb a tree and I’ve refused due to fear? How many times has my fear been the determining factor in my decisions and actions rather than trust in my Father and Lord Jesus?

What about you?

What trees are there for me to climb today?

What about you?