This morning as I was getting ready for the day, I noticed something fantastic in our bedroom. Light. Rays of light streamed through my windows and a puddle of sunshine warmed my lazy dog who laid on the bed. The sun. A new day was rising and today it was not only a new day, but a day that was promising to be warm. There was a different dimension to this light piercing through my windows, spring was attached to it. Oh, how I long for the warmth of the sun to bring forth spring.
While I know that we still have 24 days of winter until it is officially spring, daily we are inching closer and closer to spring. The season of renewal, the season of new life and a season of restoration.
As I walked out to my car, the sun warming my face and making my soul smile, my heart leapt when I saw the tiny shoots of green peaking through the dull mulch. Spring is coming.
I love to garden so when we moved into our house 4 years ago, I immediately started planting flowers. I planted a ton of bulbs during the fall in hopes that they would push through the earth and grow in the spring. Tulips are my favorite.
What I love about bulbs is the ease of which the flower grows. You plant it in the fall and it comes up in the spring, every single year. They come after months of cold, of snow, of grey dreary days and they spring forth, in beautiful arrays of color proclaiming that the new season has come. Spring.
But there is a spiritual comparison that I love as well. Bulbs have to be planted deep enough that they take root over the winter and then in the spring they can bloom. Likewise, our roots have to be deep in Christ in order for us to bloom. But what causes us to bloom?
Sometimes in order for us to bloom into the beautiful creation God has created us to be, we have to endure months of cold, of snow, of grey dreary days.
Those days may look like suffering. They may look like pain. They may look like stagnant prayers and doubt. They may look like asking God over and over, “Why?” They may look like silence.
But just like the sun brings forth life to the flowers, the Son brings forth life to us. And just like the flowers have to keep pushing up through the mud, we too have to keep looking up and pushing through the mud of life towards our light, our friend Jesus.
Friends, if you are in a season of suffering, of pain, of loss, of doubt, of questioning, keep looking up. Keep pushing through the mud. Keep fighting to go towards the Light, the one true hope, the only source of real joy. Jesus. He is the one who makes all things new and He is the one who desires even more than you do, to usher you out of the darkness and into the light.
When the flower comes through the mud and rises from the ground, standing tall and green, it doesn’t stop there. The flower opens wide it’s buds and shows it’s inner beauty.
We are called to do the same. When God has brought us through the mud, muck and darkness of life, we are not to stay silent. We are to rejoice and proclaim the goodness of our God!
“Winter is past; the rains are over and gone. Flowers appear on the earth; the season of singing has come…” Song of Songs 2:11-12
God, you are our Light. Bring us into bloom.
beautiful reminder