longing for spring

After so many long, cold days of winter, the temperature today felt almost balmy, and the sunshine beckoned us outside. Though bundled against the wind, Josiah and I took the dog and escaped the stale air of the shut up house for the fresh air of an early March day. Never mind that there is still snow on the ground, never mind that the wind still has a good nip in it...spring is coming, and we are anxious to give it a greeting.

There's not much to see today, really. The grass is still brown, the trees are still bare of bursting buds that will soon become baby leaves. We walk both around and through the snow and splash through a couple of puddles where it is melting in earnest.

Yet down the street and around the corner we spotted something together: life emerging from the otherwise barren ground. Daffodils are pushing their way up, drawing life from the soil and strength from the sun. In my mind's eye I can see other stirrings under the ground, in places I cannot yet detect. There are bulbs, seeds, and root systems beginning to develop to support life. Yet even before these stirrings, there have been unseen forces breaking down the soil, working into seeds, preparing the perfect conditions for life to take root and grow.

There are times for each of us when our souls go through a "wintering." All around looks barren, broken, and signs of life are quenched. Yet in those cold, quiet days, there is a process God is working in us that is paving way for life. It may be quite unnoticeable to the eye of the one going through it or to those who are observing, but there is an unseen Force behind those difficult days. Then almost imperceptibly, the soul that has been prepared by the winter days begins to bring forth life. Time will show that life will not be held back but will burst forth in great beauty and strength.

When winter gives way to spring, there will be much rejoicing, yet that spring could not have come had it not been for the winter.

John 12:24 "I tell you the truth, unless a kernal of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds."

Hosea 6:3 "Let us acknowledge the Lord; let us press on to acknowledge him. As surely as the sun rises, he will appear; he will come to us like the winter rains, like the spring rains that water the earth."