Well, hello, my friends and welcome to the Live Inspired podcast, Monday and Morning Moments with John O'Leary.

We record these each week so that you and I can begin these weeks and these days in awe

and on fire with the burst of inspiration. We're going to kick this one off with a quote from my buddy Herman

Hess. Herman wrote that trees have always been the most penetrating preachers. Well, the first trip Beth

and I took as a young couple was to San Francisco.

As picturesque as the city was, it was what we encountered upon leaving the city that was most remarkable.

With the most recent devastating fires engulfing California, it is my hope that the lessons I learned decades ago might inspire us with courage to keep moving forward boldly today.

Let me tell you more about it.

The mighty Sequoia National Forest abounds with trees stretching hundreds of feet into the air.

These are some of the oldest, some of the toughest, some of the tallest trees in the entire world.

The enormity of it all is stunning, but learning what makes these trees so mighty is the real gift.

Let me give you four things that really set them apart.

Number one, the scars make them stronger, and it does the same for you.

These mighty trees have existed in a fire-prone area

for more than 2,000 years. They not only survive the fires, but they thrive because of them.

The scarred and the marred burnt bark reveals the pain of past fires, that's true, but also

visible proof of survival.

The new bark actually grows around the old burned edges and it becomes even stronger because of it.

It turns out we all have scars. We all can view them merely as a painful reminder of what has

happened and all that we've lost,

or we can view them as a badge of honor for what we have survived,

all we have learned, and the courage to keep moving forward.

...