I hate cold weather! Which means I really struggle with seeing anything good about winter. Everything dies (externally) and I end up feeling the same way. Yesterday, I was talking to one of my friends from church and he asked me how I was doing . I said “Ole Man Winter is kicking my butt” . He then proceeded to get excited and tell me that he was very grateful for the cold winter. He said that winters like this kill off a lot insects and deceases and the deep cold frost helps the land for planting and harvests. I never realized what a positive affect winter had because of my negative attitude towards it. So really, winter is conducive to producing life.
I realized something this morning thinking about all this. There are times in my life when things needed to die so I could produce life. I look back and see there have been some long cold winters in my soul where not much was happening spiritually. They were very frustrating and I hadn’t heard from God in a long time. Here without me knowing, God was preparing me for a new work but needed to let some attitudes and ideas either about myself or him die. Growing to maturity is a process of living through levels of spiritual winters and then spring times. I see today that God has been doing something over this winter which I believe will produce a new harvest later in the year.
We should not be disillusioned by the winters of our soul but trust that what ever dies will make room for God to bring new life!
