The past week's excitement and gratitude I experienced was due to the fantastically colorful scenic trip to Tennessee. A couple of days after we arrived, the cruel wind and rain made an appearance; they whipped the bowing trees mercilessly. There was no compassion in their fury, no song in the wind and no gentle raindrops. The saddened boughs wept a season of splendorous clothing, they fell to the ground in sodden heaps; the purples, reds, oranges, and yellows began the slow transformation into brown crumbly sameness. A new cycle had come, the wind and rain stayed and played their tormenting games, the tumbling leaves fled, flew, and scampered, still they could not escape, so fall they did.
I found gratitude for the sun that overcame the wicked weather a few times and in those moments, the drifting leaves had a beauty of their own, seeming to burst in little spits of flame as the rays torched them, a fore- shadowing perhaps?
What was beauty to the eye when beheld high in the trees ( in the early part of this season) became treacherous when under the feet, the slippery surface clinging to sloes and grass with the same intensity and another fall comes to mind, so I walk in a kind of flat footed stomp. After combing through the leaves and receiving enough attention the wind and rain head on east and the unhindered Sun shone bright and strong, still reflecting on the few stronger, braver leaves that were able to cling for a while longer.
The unclothed trees with the least resistance now stand with their trunks bared and with empty limbs uplifted, they seem to be prepared to beg for mercy from the soon returning untamed winter winds and rains. Perhaps beyond that, deeper into the new year, their pose may reflect a frozen anticipation for the time they can re-live infancy at the season of budding; adolescence in the time of leafing and preening then beauty starts all over as they don Easter bonnets, and all will choose green maybe adorned with blossoms. I experience gratitude at the faithfulness of God’s unchanging handiwork in the season cycles!
And so, the seasons go, I think of all that God has set in motion in nature, and how it ever conforms to his plan and is moving on a steady and fixed path. That which God has set in motion in his highest creations, and the seasons we cycle through are also ever moving but not always at a steady pace. Our seasons are ruled by emotions, happenings, choices, pressures, not just the passing of time alone, there is no correct amount of growth or delay in our seasons.
Our day may not necessarily follow our night, the time we bloom may not be in our youth, our right may not conquer wrong, adjudication of our trials in this world may never happen. Our cycle of life may take a u-turn, form a square, become oblong and bounce along because of decisions made and paths chosen. There are few pre-made appointments for us for the most part this vehicle in which we’re racing through life, is manned by us, “free-will”, interpreted, “free-wheel” , we are the driver, unless we choose not to be. We choose self and chance, or God and surety, that choice determines weather the oblongs, squares loops or lopsided circles in our seasons matter at all.
I do not use the term “lessons” often, I equate that with being forced, I prefer the free form of act of stumbling upon and having a realization of some small thought, I have a tiny spark of rebellion remaining, sorry! So then, these thoughts are some of the “discoveries” that I have made when I have not been busy with my every day life of doing and being. I am making plans to embrace my seasons in gratitude and just let them cycle on guided by my Fathers hands.
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