itsawonderfilledlife

The leaves are changing, falling.

The sun struggles to come up, rushes to go back down.

The birds fly, no longer lazily on their own, but determinedly with others.

Air is not longer stifling, motionless, but moving and with a chill.

The season of harvest is coming to an end.

Autumn has fallen onto our laps.

It is a season of change.

About a year ago I sat in a coffee shop, sipping a warm drink with a woman of great character, reputation and heart. We shared stories of our children, our hubbies, ourselves. We listened, we laughed, we shared what God was teaching us.

It was then that I shared a secret that I felt that God had been whispering to me. I told her of how for days, weeks really, I had a sense of change in the air. Not just change, but a sense of foreboding, that what might be coming might also not be desired, good, or pleasant. That was not all, I also had the most unexpected sense of peace.

Change, whether in the form of seasons of the year, or seasons of life, is inevitable and carries with it both anticipation and dread. Change means our normal is no longer our normal.

There is something interesting in the falling of leaves. Their falling is ultimately caused by lack of daylight, which signals change to the trees. The minerals in the leaves travel to the branches. Eventually the leaves change color, then fall, leaving the tree naked and lifeless … just what it needs to be as it enters the dormant winter season. Then, as winter comes to an end, those stored minerals do their work, and buds form on the branches, heralding new life, a new season.

Changes in our lives can also seem to usher us into dark, lifeless, or dormant seasons. Yet, we can be assured that there is always a spring that follows the darkness, the cold of winter.

“For You have tried us, O God;
You have refined us as silver is refined.”
Psalm 66:10