A Hedge of Protection?

Words on Worship…
Spring brings, among other things, the joy to homeowners of cleaning up the yard: pruning, raking, pruning, hauling, pruning, fertilizing, pruning, mulching, pruning, landscaping, pruning, weed-killing, pruning, and, well, you get the point. There was the Spring I chose to undertake the mother of all projects: pruning back the thistles and briars left behind by the Kansas "Hedgeapple" trees that I had removed last season.
Let’s go back to that Easter weekend —Saturday to be exact— sun shining, wind more than blowing, and Pastor D. in the back forty determined to win at the fight of the thistles. Anyone who has been in Kansas for any length of time has seen the native Hedge tree: they line all the farmers’ old property lines. Not real attractive, but they weren’t planted for their beauty. They were planted for their sturdiness… for their ability to withstand the Kansas wind, heat, and weather. They are extremely hard, rough, thorny, and …ugly. That’s why, after eight years of cleaning up after them, I decided to get rid of them. So last fall this guy takes them all out…right down to the stump as I had asked him to.
This spring, I get this whole new crop of hedge — thorny “suckers” as they’re called — shooting to the sky as they pop at random from these stumps (a “shoot from the stump of Jesse?”). As I work at my task with heavy gloves and long-sleeved shirt for protection, the constant pricking of my hands and arms in spite of my precautions stirs me to think, “of what value are these things to the basic homeowner, anyway?” The wind stirs, my mind stirs, and the thorns prick and tear at my skin, as I begin some pretty strange questions to God (I talk to God a lot when I’m in the yard…just in case you ever walk up on me talking to myself…). Questions such as, “God, why do I really have to be the one cleaning these out…writing a song might be more enjoyable right now.” Amazing how God works. I will never forget it. It was Easter Saturday…the day after Good Friday…I was being pricked by a few thorns…they were not nearly as long and sharp as those that I saw the previous summer in Jerusalem. Then I took a branch, pruned it to a straight, four-foot shoot, and formed a ring —let’s call it a crown— then I wept. No way I could put that on my head…