Under The Fig Tree

This morning, as part of my January rhythm, I began with a simple question:

Where do I sense God’s nearness?

There was no immediate answer.

No clarity rushing in.

Only a quiet invitation to move my body toward stillness.

So I went outside and sat beneath my fig tree.

Its wide leaves held the light gently, not too bright, not too dark ~ just enough. Earth beneath me. Green pressing close. Breath slowing into something truer.

And there, under the fig tree, a line of Scripture rose within me, as if spoken for the first time:

“Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you.”

— John 1:48

It did not arrive as something to investigate, but something to receive.

I was not striving to be seen.

Not producing.

Not proving.

I was simply there.

This year, as I have shared the word I have been given is lamp not a spotlight or a blaze of certainty, but a steady light for the next step. And under the fig tree this morning, I understood something more clearly: a lamp does not search for God’s nearness.

It reveals it.

God’s presence was not waiting somewhere else, not in a clearer answer or a better posture ~ but right there, in the ordinary shelter of a tree grown slowly over time. In stillness. In attention. In being seen without effort.

Under the fig tree, all was well.

Nothing needed to be added.

Nothing needed to be fixed.

Just light enough for this moment.

And that, it seems, is how this year will be lived.

And so I say to you and you AND even you ~

May the light given to you today be enough for where you are seen.