Kimberley Sasan
Blog Contributor
Background photograph by Kevin Grieve used with permission via UpSplash
Winter
I am a born and raised Southern California girl. The weather there is a balmy 72 degrees and sunny nearly every day of the year. Last year my family and I moved to a little island off the coast of Washington state where the seasons are always in full effect. Needless to say, it has been quite an experience. Having now lived through all four seasons, I can say confidently that we have fully enjoyed it. (My husband was not so sure this city girl from SoCal would.)
I have this window in my kitchen that I look out each time I stand at the sink, which works out to be no less than 10 times a day. From there, I have watched the trees outside this window change from one season to the next. At the end of the fall, I looked out into a mass of bare branches and limbs. What followed in the weeks to come was something very unexpected and unfamiliar.
At first, I assured myself that, “One day in the Spring those trees will be full of leaves again.”
In mid Winter I wondered, “Were those trees ever as full as I remember?”
Then later I thought, “There might not have ever been leaves there.”
By February I told myself, “Those trees are dead.”
I never expected them to be totally bare for so long that I would actually start questioning the life in those trees. (Nor did I realize just how magical the palm trees are in the Sunshine State.)
It’s no surprise to you that all of a sudden one day early this Spring, the leaves were back! I watched them go from little green buds dotting every single branch to full blown leaves so thick I couldn’t even see through to the other side. Of course, then I asked myself, “How could you have doubted?” Yet there was God with that loving smile on His face - you know the one I mean - and He said to my heart, “The day is mine, and also the night; I established the sun and moon. It was I who set all the boundaries of the earth; I made both summer and winter.” (Psalm 74:16-17)
Then I realized this was not as unfamiliar as I thought. I began to recall the moments in my life when I thought something was dead and gone only to realize that it wasn’t at all. It was there beneath a Winter snow, waiting for God’s appointed time. If Winter has taught me anything, it’s that His resurrection power is at work in my life as evidently as it is in those trees outside my window. Even if I doubt, those leaves will come again. Even if I don’t see it, faith tells me it’s there. Even if I’ve declared it dead, He will breath life back into it.
Now when I stand at the sink and look out that window, no less than 10 times a day, I see those leaves and say, “He has come to bring me LIFE!” (John 10:10)
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