I was driving home from my mother’s the other day, a route now very familiar to me after 36 years of living in the NorthState. I know every curve in the road, and so accustomed have I become to the sights on each side that I view them with a routine familiarity. Until . . .
The Central Valley is flat — very flat — so why there are rises in the highway, I’m not sure, but there is one in Willows, and as one crests the rise there is a beautiful orchard off to the right.
This last journey, after Christmas, however, I noticed something. A house. A house I used to see and admire before the orchard grew and blocked my view, hiding the house behind a sea of green. But now because it’s winter, I was able to see it again.
Which made me think. Winter gets a bad rap.
Yes, it is cold, bleak, and pretty monochromatic—gray. It can’t compete with the peaceful beauty of fall foliage or the exuberant explosion of spring blossoms. (It does, however, beat summer if only because our winters are about two months shorter than our summers and the cold is not as intense as that summer heat.)
But on this trip home, the lack of leaves and my sudden awareness gave me a new appreciation for a season that many would like to avoid.
Life is similar. We don’t like those winter seasons — when things are not going well for us. When life is cold and barren. When the leaves of happiness, money, opportunities, and love all seem to have vanished and our lives seem bare indeed, BUT . . .
It is also at times like these that we often see God much clearer. His mercy and love. His faithfulness and power. His perfect wisdom and goodness. And, of course, His presence, which has never left us but is something we may have forgotten because of the earthly clutter between us.
So when life seems to be cold and void of beauty, remember not to stare at the barren trees but instead, as the old hymn reminds us, to "Turn your eyes upon Jesus, Look full in his wonderful face, And the things of earth will grow strangely dim, In the light of his glory and grace.”
The Central Valley is flat — very flat — so why there are rises in the highway, I’m not sure, but there is one in Willows, and as one crests the rise there is a beautiful orchard off to the right.
This last journey, after Christmas, however, I noticed something. A house. A house I used to see and admire before the orchard grew and blocked my view, hiding the house behind a sea of green. But now because it’s winter, I was able to see it again.
Which made me think. Winter gets a bad rap.
Yes, it is cold, bleak, and pretty monochromatic—gray. It can’t compete with the peaceful beauty of fall foliage or the exuberant explosion of spring blossoms. (It does, however, beat summer if only because our winters are about two months shorter than our summers and the cold is not as intense as that summer heat.)
But on this trip home, the lack of leaves and my sudden awareness gave me a new appreciation for a season that many would like to avoid.
Life is similar. We don’t like those winter seasons — when things are not going well for us. When life is cold and barren. When the leaves of happiness, money, opportunities, and love all seem to have vanished and our lives seem bare indeed, BUT . . .
It is also at times like these that we often see God much clearer. His mercy and love. His faithfulness and power. His perfect wisdom and goodness. And, of course, His presence, which has never left us but is something we may have forgotten because of the earthly clutter between us.
So when life seems to be cold and void of beauty, remember not to stare at the barren trees but instead, as the old hymn reminds us, to "Turn your eyes upon Jesus, Look full in his wonderful face, And the things of earth will grow strangely dim, In the light of his glory and grace.”
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