Just as winter melts into spring
It’s easy with a winter like we’ve had to throw our eyes to the skies and wonder if the snow will ever. stop. falling.
The cold and freezing fingers. The car sliding just beyond stop signs. The Nativity set still standing in the yard at the edge of the neighborhood. The mounds of snow on either side of the drive that keep growing and growing and growing and growing. All sad little reminders that even though it’s March, it’s still not spring.
And oh, I ache for spring.
The bright sun dancing high over head. The smell of the earth melting away from winter’s hold. The birds chirping beyond my window at the break of day. The air fresh and invigorating, speaking life into places weary of winters cold. All memories of spring seasons past, fueling the longing to leave this cold, hard winter behind.
The boys and I ventured outside on one of the rare days of warmth last month. The sun was shining, the air had lost it’s bite, and despite the mounds of snow, the sky was so perfect it almost whispered spring. I sat down in the middle of our front yard with the boys playing around me, my snow pants slowly soaking in the dampness, and turned my face toward the sun just to feel it’s warmth. I texted a friend later that those moments outside recharged my soul in a way I didn’t know I needed, and for that day, I was filled with the hope that spring was coming for us.
You of course know the end to that story, but despite the subsequent days of dreary weather, I’ve tried to keep that day in focus. A whispered promise that spring will eventually come.
It’s a little more challenging with my kids. Elijah has taken to asking me, on an almost daily basis, when winter will ever end. I smile at him, pushing my own frustrations aside, and tell him I don’t know the exact day, but that I do know for certain spring will come.
Because it always does.
His question has caused me to consider my own response to some of those grown-up-adult-things I find myself waiting for. I pray lots of “how long, oh Lord” type prayers, wondering when some of the stressors of life will ever stop pressing down so hard on my heart. I know that God sees me. I know He hears my prayers. But for now, the complete answer I’ve been asking for hasn’t come. I’ve had sunny days scattered through the cold, but no real spring.
It’s an interesting position to be in, this space between faith and a sometimes frustrating reality, and it’s sometimes filled with more questions than I’d like.
Maybe you can relate.
What I keep reminding myself in my moments weary with the waiting, is that someday there will be another side to this story. Someday there will be a time I find it difficult to even remember the struggles I face today. But until then I choose to take my life one moment at a time, trusting God will give me the answer I need for the moment I’m living, and that He’ll continue to come through with enough grace for the next. Even though it seems like this season has dragged on for far to long, I know it will end.
I don’t know what you’re waiting for, what prayers remain unanswered, or what mountain of snow is sitting beyond the front door of your house. What I do know is that spring is coming. For you. For me. Watch for the sun in the sky, and the grass poking beneath the snow, and the days the temperature creeps above freezing. There are moments that whisper spring’s promise, but sometimes we have to train our eyes to see them.
And until then we do our waiting with promise . . . just as winter always, eventually melts into spring.