Living in the same home for 30+ years comes with many good things and some more difficult ones. We love our neighborhood, love the people who we are doing life with, love our backyard (although quite neglected) and overall we are thankful for our place we call home.
25+ years ago friends visited us and their young children brought us a coffee can with a small walnut tree that they had grown as a school project. I still remember the day we decided together to plant it. It has brought us so much joy, the change of colors, the growing of the tree, the shade it provided for years. But over the last years we notice some issues with the tree... and today we have professionals looking at it, taking out the diseased parts and hopefully save our tree.
That all made me think of the gifts and abilities in our community. We don't have a clue on how to trim a tree, know what needs to come down, what is infested and what can stay and be saved. We don't know
how to climb a tree and come back down safely. We don't know how to mulch it and repurpose it in our
front garden. There are people who do this well, and that is their expertise and they should get paid well
for that.
We each have gifts and abilities, and as the quote goes "Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid." Yes, we all can learn skills, but a strong community relies on each other. We can't be experts in everything. I can't drive a big rig, I can't fix a kidney, I can't balance a city budget or protect people from fires. There are other things I can do, and we could understand that we all have a role to play in our community. We can work together to make our place the best city ever.
In our divided world, let's seek out each other's gifts and strengths, enjoy learning from experts and enjoy the journey of life together.