The Baobab Tree proverb

When bringing teams over to Tanzania, they always want to take pictures of the baobab tree (I have sometimes called it the balboa tree because that is how many locals pronounce it).  Various species can grow to be 98 feet tall and 112 feet in diameter and they have been carbon dated at 1275 years old.  They are so distinctive that it is a reference point for things like bus stops (my bus stop is at one of these trees before you start up the mountain). They are known as great water sources and food for elephants, Bee Hives and monkeys love to live inside of the hollow center.
What I have always loved most about these trees is the folklore surrounding them.  My favorite story is about how it used to be the most beautiful tree in all the world.  But it lorded it's beauty over all the other plants and tree. It even lorded it beauty over the animals and did not allow them shelter or water or to eat it's leaves.  This angered God because He had made this tree beautiful so that all the animals would come to it for shelter, food and water.  So God reached down and pulled the tree up from the ground, turned it over and stuck it back in the ground making it one of the least attractive but it still provided shelter, food and water for the animals serving its purpose.

"The Lord does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart." 1 Samuel 16:7b (NIV)

Can it really be that the story of the Baobab tree is really about this verse.  I think it is.  The tree while beautiful on the outside did not do the things God intended it to do.  Now though it is considered by many to be unattractive and looks like its roots are stuck up in the air, it is a beloved tree because it provides so much to others.  What if we all focus on doing what God intended us to do not on how we look, what car we drive, and so forth.

This is what the Lord says:  "Let not the wise man boast of his wisdom, or the strong man boast of his strength or the rich man boast of his riches, but let him who boasts boast about this:  that he  understands and knows me, that I am the Lord, who exercises kindness, justice and righteousness on earth for in these I delight," declares the Lord.  Jeremiah 9:23-24 (NIV)

Now see the Baobab tree with it's surroundings-it stands out in the landscape.

Location: Singida, Tanzania

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