Ecclesiastes 3:1 For everything there is a season, a time for every activity under heaven.
We drove across part of the Allegany’s yesterday afternoon. It was lovely, with a frosting of snow, heavy gray clouds, and the stark beauty only a wintery woods provide. Still and all, looking out across the scene I could see the reddish tips of branches through the white and gray, swollen with promise at bitter, cold, years’ end.
I’d like to be like that.
I feel like shivering, shrivelling. Socially distancing until you can’t see me anymore. Retreating from threatening weather. Looking for one of those new-fangled, heated, plastic domes I saw at a sidewalk cafe last night. A respite to make this ugly time in our country look and feel a little sweeter, before the waiter brings the check and I must pay the piper and step out into the icy wind and potholed street.
But while I’ve been trying to avoid the cold, the sturdy, resilient trees have been planning for spring.
It’s a new year. I need to set my buds if I trust the promise-keeper.
God of the seasons, help me be like a tree, wired to look ahead anticipating your promises, rather than looking for escape from whatever I fear.
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