Winter. No one wants to think about it this time of year
(except a few snow bunnies I have as friends), but it's inevitably coming.
Although winter has a few highlights for me (Christmas and my daughter's
birthday), most of the time the word "winter" sends a chill down my
spine. Interestingly enough, the cons that come to mind about winter can be
spelled out in two word phrases such as limited travel, close quarters, less
sunshine, blistering cold, tight muscles. Even the personification of Old Man Winter
brings a mental picture of a white bearded, cruel curmudgeon who delights in
hurling snowball grenades and icicle spears at a climate-oppressed people. The
challenge that I face in the wintertime is getting through it with joy, and not
losing hope. Does that describe your struggle between December and March?
As in the other seasons of the soul, there is a winter. If
you're not in wintertime, there is a high probability that it is coming your
way. If you've ever been through an extended season of loss, trial, and
hardship, you've been through a soul winter. Life around you seems less
forgiving; the blows just keep coming like a regularly scheduled barrage of
winter storms. Instead of having your arms wide open in stunning vulnerability,
you find your arms embracing yourself tightly waiting for the other shoe to
drop. Instead of abundance and freedom, you are scrimping and struggling
spiritually. You remember with sad longing the days when you were coasting
effortlessly, but now you find yourself inching up a steep incline. But if this
is where these words find you, don't despair. Surprisingly, everything you've
learned in all the other seasons will help you get through this rough patch.
How?
Stay Warm
I spend my winter going from one warm place to another. I go
from the house to the van. From the van to the store. Although I can't avoid
being outside entirely, I know that the cold isn't my final destination;
getting to a warm place is key. In order to stay warm in this brutal soul
season you're in, you have to cover the area that loses the most heat: your
head. So many battles are waged inside the mind, and keeping your mind
"warm" in the midst of the icy blasts of life is like fortifying the
command center of an organization. As the state of the mind goes, so goes the
rest of the individual. It's a struggle to not become bitter when life gets
sour, but it's not impossible. In the summer,
we learned to give thanks- and that's one way to stay warm. Giving thanks isn't
just for November- it's a 365 day of year proposition. In every soul season,
there is always something to be thankful for. In spring, we learned to beautify our surroundings; that we can
use wisdom to make any situation beautiful, and this includes our minds.
And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix
your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely,
and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise.
Philippians 4:8 NLT
These words were penned by the bad-guy-turned-good-guy
Apostle Paul not while he was on the beach sipping a cold drink, or in the
company of friends at the lake, but alone in a prison. A PRISON. And not the
kind of prison that inmates in America experience today, but a dank, dark
dungeon. Through the power of the Holy Spirit, Paul was able to experience
warmth in the midst of a soul winter. His arms and legs may have been in
shackles, and his physical body behind stone and bars, but his mind and his
spirit were free. To loosely borrow lyrics from "My Girl", when it was
cold inside, he had the month of May. His mind was set on the exact opposites
of what he was experiencing. His thoughts shot straight past the small truths
about what he was feeling, and with the laser focus we learned about in autumn, he was able to hone into
the bigger truths about God's character. Paul turned his spirit from a
thermometer, subject to the changing climate around him, to a thermostat, that
controlled the climate around him, and thereby he was able to keep warm.
Keep Hope Alive
In the dead of winter, I find myself looking online for
pictures of warm, lush places. I've been known to change the wallpaper of my
phone to a beach, or a flower carpeted field somewhere. Am I torturing myself?
Maybe. But deep down inside, I'm nursing the thought that someday, the barren
wasteland around me will match the picture I have on my phone. Jeremiah in the
Bible was in a horrible state when he looked around him. All he saw was pain,
devastation, loss, and hopelessness. His people had turned their backs on God,
and were now living out the dire consequences. His heart was dashed into pieces
remembering Israel's glory days, and now seeing her desolation. The picture of
the past didn't match the picture from the present. Let's crouch down to his
slumped posture and feel his agony.
I cry out, "My splendor is gone! Everything I had hoped
for from the Lord is lost!" The thought of my suffering and homelessness
is bitter beyond words. I will never forget this awful time, as I grieve over
my loss. Lamentations 3: 18-20
Pretty depressing, huh? But that's life sometimes. Not the
pretty picture we are often painting on social media. Jack Frost has nothing on
the searing bite life can have. And yet in the vicious soul winter squall, we
see a break in the clouds over Jeremiah's head, and hope streams down in silken
threads:
Yet I still dare to hope when I remember this: the faithful
love of the Lord never ends! His mercies never cease. Great is His
faithfulness; His mercies begin afresh each morning. I say to myself, "The
Lord is my inheritance; therefore I will hope in Him!" Lamentations 3:
21-24
In Disney/Pixar's film Wall-E, the earth was trashed. Quite
literally. The entire landscape of earth was piled so high and so deep with
trash that life was choked out. But not all life. In the midst of the mountains
of debris, Wall-E finds something completely paradoxical. Somehow, someway, a
tiny green plant was able to thrive in the most unforgiving soil. He gingerly
scooped up that tender life form with the earth surrounding it, and placed it
in an old boot. SPOILER ALERT: the rest of the movie is built around him and
his companion Eve protecting this plant from destruction. Hope must be
protected that vigilantly. There is so much in life that threatens to pry open
the sweaty fingers we're using to cling to hope and get us to let it go. World
events. Difficulties.
Hope is outnumbered by a million and one things, and yet
only a sliver is needed to overcome them all. If we place our hope in God,
we'll realize that even in a seemingly eternal soul winter, His mercies do
begin afresh every morning.
With the rising of the sun, comes enough hope to
get us through our day. And when we pillow our heads that night and all seems
lost, we wake up to new hope the next morning. Might life still be hard and
cold? Probably. But there is always hope. Answer your soul winter's bludgeoning
by daring to hope. Winter won't last forever. It's a season, remember? It has a
beginning, a middle, and a rewarding end: springtime. Until then, stay warm,
and keep hope alive.
