Nurse Logs—A Lesson on Death and New Life
“So let me be tutored by this new disappointment. Let me listen to its holy whisper, that I may release at last these lesser dreams. That I might embrace the better dreams you dream for me, and for your people, and for your kingdom, and for your creation.”
Nurse log near Snoqualmie Falls, Washington State
What death are you facing in your life right now? I’m not necessarily talking about death with a capital "D"—although that is what some of us are facing. Rather, I’m referring to those lowercase "d" deaths, the ones we face regularly, possibly even daily. These deaths often propel us from one season of our lives to another although we often only see it in hindsight.
It’s our dreams that most often die. The new and exciting job that we worked so hard for turns out to be hugely disappointing. The marriage we entered into with such hopeful expectation dies slowly or suddenly. The dream of having children. Finding a partner. Good health. Mobility. Financial security. Like a tree falling over, we feel the painful thud as it hits the forest floor.
In June our family took a trip to the Pacific Northwest to celebrate my son’s graduation. On a hike through the woods, I came upon a marvelous sight. It took a moment to figure out what exactly I was looking at. A strangely elevated tree perched on top of an old rotting stump with elongated roots sort of oozing down the outside of the stump. This decaying stump is known as a “nurse log.” The stump, all that remains of a once great tree, provides moisture and protection for the seeds of new trees to take root and grow. Once I noticed this first nurse log, I began to see them everywhere. On a hike through the temperate rainforest outside of Vancouver, BC, every stump and fallen log was a nursery for moss, small shrubs, and great trees, the most common being the western hemlock and western red cedar. Some logs were hosting three or more massive trees. I even spotted two large hemlocks growing out of the upsidedown root bed of a fallen tree. The whole forest had been birthed out of death.
Imagine. Death, destruction, decay. Then seemingly nothing. But slowly from the very remnants of what was torn down and broken emerges new life. This new life grows directly out of the very flesh of the old and broken tree. In fact it’s the old and broken tree that provides the necessary conditions for the new tree to grow.
I can imagine many figurative parallels, but one that comes to mind most readily is the death of one dream paving the way for a new dream. As I look back on my own life, I see that pattern play itself out over and over again. I see what looked like only loss and grief turn slowly into something new and different, rather unexpected at times. In these deaths I was frustrated, angry, disheartened, and confused. I clung to the old dream even as the seeds of a new one were being planted and taking root. It took time to release these old dreams from my imagination and make room for new ones to emerge. As I observe nurse logs in the forest, I realize that death is painful. Inevitable. Ever present. But never wasted.
With this perspective, we are girded with hope. The hope that God is, even in death, making all things new. Douglas McKelvey’s “Death of a Dream” in Every Moment Holy Volume I speaks to the notion of being “tutored” by our disappointments so that in listening to the “holy whisper” we might embrace new and better dreams than the ones we dreamed for ourselves.
Read more about nurse logs here and here
Read Douglas McKelvey’s “Death of a Dream” here
