Blossoms

The month of September is the start of the spring season where I live. The days start warming up after the winter, and the sun rises earlier in the morning. However, the trees and plant life are generally still dry, lifeless and dreary in September, because our rain is generally not due for another month or two. Last year our rainy season didn’t come with the necessary amount of rainfall we’re accustomed to, and this year the drought has continued.

The park across from my home has not showcased it usual green, plush beauty for a long while. In other parts of our country the farmers have suffered under the crippling drought, and food for their cattle had to be transported to them from other areas.

Right at the beginning of the month of September, as I drove to work, I had such a wonderful surprise. It just lifted my spirit! As I drove past the park, my eye caught a tree covered in pink spring blossoms. It was literally the only tree I could see which was blooming. It carried with it the promise that spring was on the way, in spite of the drought. Because of this lovely and unexpected surprise, it caused me to look around at the other trees along my way, searching the branches for more signs of the new season which was approaching.

There are some seasons of our lives which feel as if they are never ending. Circumstances seem to resemble that dry, lifeless and dreary vegetation. One day flows into another, and even our hope that the next season will carry the much needed change, we long for, runs thin.

But in Genesis 8:22 God put a definite law in place: ‘While the earth remains, seed time and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease’. While the earth remains seasons will bring the growth and vegetation and changes in temperature which characterise each season – it is a given. Seasons WILL change. This should encourage us that our own personal season won’t last forever. As seasons will change in the natural, so seasons will change in our own lives.

Don’t lose hope. You’re not invisible to God in the season you find yourself in. God’s at work behind the scenes to bring about the very thing which will cause that situation to suddenly and unexpectedly bring forth colourful blossoms! He’s a God of the ‘suddenlies’, but also a God who’s in control of the timing of our personal seasons. Hold on a little longer. Keep looking out for the ‘blossoms’ in your situation which signal the promise of the new things ahead.

Prayer: Father, I get so discouraged when the difficult seasons I find myself in feel like they’ll never change, but thank You for Your Word which is faithful and true, and unchanged. Thank You that new things are on the way and about to blossom in my life, even when I can’t yet perceive it. Help me not to grow weary and lose confidence in Your promises. I choose to lean on You and to trust Your timing, in Jesus’ name. Amen.