Faith Matters 33: For The Gardner News, March 10, 2007
The Hope of Spring
The cold has been so bitter these last few days that even Sophie prefers to stay inside. Looking out the window for signs of spring, I still see a wintry landscape and the long expanse of yard crusted over with snow and ice. It’s easy to lament along with the psalmist, “How long, Lord? How long?” Finally, though, there’s a thirty foot stretch of bare earth, a swatch of brown and stubbly grass that winds its way down the hill through the icy landscape outside my window. In spite of freezing temperatures, the late winter sunshine is slowly making inroads into the frozen ground, especially on the hillside where an underground stream flows unseen beneath the lawn. Risking the cold for a quick walk with Sophie, I find the light even coaxing up a few snowdrops, the promise of springtime to come.
For many of us the life of faith unfolds as mysteriously as this process we see unfolding outside the window right now. It follows its own timetable, with seasons of ebb and flow. There are those who have mountain-top conversion experiences that change their lives in an instant. But for most of us, the mysterious ways of the Spirit are not as quick or dramatic, even though they might be just as just as life changing. Often our personal awareness of the great mystery we call God starts in lives already prepared by the waters of baptism and the nurture of parents and church. Into this rich ground comes some pivotal new experience of the grace of God. For some, it’s the result of something positive: like the birth of a child, a new marriage or relationship, or a new career that opens up the world in new ways. It might be an encounter with God at church, on a retreat, or in solitude. We suddenly feel our lives strangely warmed in a new way as we begin to see our relationship with the world, with each other and with life itself in a new light.
Sometimes it’s in our times of greatest loss or crisis that the grace of God enters our life. Faced with intractable illness, disability, or seeing our lives and relationships crumbling or sliding out of reach, sometimes it’s at moments like these that we are humbled and realize we are totally dependent on a power greater than ourselves for all we have and all we are. Maybe these moments alone will turn our lives around completely.
But if not nurtured, encouraged, and shared with others, they can be nipped like buds lulled into bloom by an unseasonably warm winter day.
To come fully alive, our spirits need the gentle and persistent warming of community. This takes time and trust. It takes opening ourselves to others who care about us and our spiritual journey. We need others who will listen and not judge, who will offer their support and their shoulders. We need the persistence of community to help sustain us through the wintry times and give us hope when we can’t feel it ourselves. We need to be able to see God working in others, especially when we can’t yet see God working within us.
We are called to journey together, as companions, leaning on one another, encouraging one another, nurturing one another. Only in the warmth of friendship, care and love does the Spirit come fully alive in us, sustaining us through all the seasons of the year and the seasons of our lives.