For Everything There Is A Season...

I love the change-of-seasons time each year. The transitions from Summer to Autumn and from Winter to Spring are the best.

This weekend it was sunny and hot (we spent a good deal of Sabbath wandering along the beach, and a good deal of Sunday cooking things over a fire) - today it's cool and misty. I can see scattered cloud high above in blue sky from my office window, but looking up the hill between trees the distance blurs into mist. I've got my office light off and the blinds way open so the light in here comes and goes as the mist ebbs and flows.

Trees are blossoming and evidence of Spring is all around. Yet my veggie patch is taking a while to start growing. Something is holding back the sudden growth spurt I was expecting. Things like spinach, that usually pop right up, have yet to appear.

I'm feeling a lot like that veggie patch right now. The seeds are in there (somewhere!), but nothing's happening. Just weeds coming up, but nothing useful. Heck, even the weeds are taking a long time to grow! Perhaps there's something wrong with my soil? Has it been poisoned, or does it not have enough earthworms? I just don't know. Perhaps I need to get down to the garden shop (church) and stock up on some fertilizer - even though I've sworn off anything non-organic. I really can't just expect the soil to naturally do it's thing without help, can I?

Maybe it's just a season thing. This is a fruitless season, one where there is no growth, only death and inactivity - for a reason that I have not the brainpower or insight to know. I don't like being here, but just as I can't force my seeds to grow, I can't force growth in me either.

Yet still I worry. Worry that I can't seem to read the Bible, worry that my soul asks "so who is this Jesus guy anyway and what does it have to do with me?", worry that inside me is a heart-shaped balloon - a thin membrane surrounding a nothing-vacuum.

Why can't I just enjoy this season of emptiness as much as I enjoy the seasons playing out on the other side of the window?