I had a chance this weekend to watch my newly purchased ebay copy of the man who planted trees by Jean Giono. This wonderful short film was first shown to me some years back by RevTC. I was reminded of it recently and thought I’d try and track down a copy as it’s a phenomenal youth work training resource.
For those who haven’t seen it, it is the story of Elzeard Bouffier, an imaginary shepherd who each day plants 100 carefully chosen acorns for the vast majority of his 87 year life and in the process manages to re-forrest a huge mass of land. He is not distracted from his work during the 2 world wars but keeps on planting, realising that the affects of his actions are much bigger than his own and that he will not see just how deeply or widely he will impact people.
If you have never read or seen this, you simply must. It’s very moving and deeply spiritual.
I plan to use it this week during some bible studies that I am leading with a team of gap year students from The Baptist Missionary Society who will be working with me this week.
