Beauty and the Pear Tree

"There is just as much beauty visible to us in the landscape as we are prepared to appreciate, and not a grain more" Henry David Thoreau

The Cleveland Pear is a glorious specimin of tree. It is the best of a series of non fruit-bearing pear trees cultivated for its stunning white shower of blossoms in early spring, as well as its lovely wax-green foliage throughout the summer and fall. It is very symetrical and compact, and in that it bears no fruit, it bears no seed. (So no little pear trees will spring up across the yard.) It just might be the perfect tree. Right now the pear trees are stunners, and wouldn't trade them for any other.

The troublesome garden metaphor for the ornamental pear, like our Cleveland Pear, is that it reveals some truth about our humanity. At times we know people, or even might be a person who is stunning and beautiful. However, over time, or careful study we find that the beauty, or good hearted nature, or charisma is showy, but quite empty. The purpose, the heart, the reason for living, seems hollow. Beyond the flash of beauty, it doesn't bring any kind of inspiration or new life or purpose. We may know someone, or perhaps we ourselves may be struggling to find a greater purpose. In order to bear fruit and plant seed, we must know who we are and where we come from, and be willing to work hard, bear much, and wear the dirt and stain of the garden.

Then he told this parable: "A man had a fig tree, planted in his vineyard, and he went to look for fruit on it, but did not find any. So he said to the man who took care of the vineyard, 'For three years now I've been coming to look for fruit on this fig tree and haven't found any. Cut it down! Why shold it use up the soil?' "

" 'Sir,' the man replied, 'leave it alone for one more year, and I'll dig around it and fertilize it. If it bears fruit next year, fine! If not, then cut it down.' " Luke 13:6-9 NIV