Lately, I feel like Charlie Brown waiting at the mailbox for a valentine from the Little Red Haired Girl. Only instead, I’m waiting for spring to arrive, and instead all I seem to be getting is snow.
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“Frost and cold! bless the Lord: give glory and eternal praise to him. Ice and snow! bless the Lord: give glory and eternal praise to him,” Daniel 3:69-70 (New Jerusalem translation)
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Frost and cold…give glory to God. Really?
Life seems to be filled with moments that beg the question: how on earth does this give glory to anything? Natural disasters. Sudden illness and death claiming loved ones. Unemployment. The loss of a friendship. It can be hard to pray, let alone give glory to God, during times like that. Those who stand witness to a loved one’s pain can feel incredibly helpless and useless.
I remember a definition of “glory” I once read that defined it as “the hidden nature and essence of God revealed.” Everything has this capacity to reveal God’s inner life: clouds as well as sunshine; winter as well as springtime; tears as well as smiles.
The morning after a late April snowstorm, I went out with my camera in hand to take a picture of what I saw before I began shoveling the driveway. As I began taking a few shots, the sun chased away the clouds and sky became blue and bright. Birds were singing loudly, defying the cold temperatures and the dearth of food. It was as if the sky, the sun, and the birds all had the springtime of God’s essence within themselves, and they could no longer hold it back.
Bless the Lord…give glory and praise to God!
I will remember this lesson whenever tears fall, and discouragement, anxiety, or confusion seems to rule the moment. Within even the most wounded and broken hearts and lives is the need and desire to reveal the goodness and mystery of God in the face of struggles for worth and dignity.
This is what it means to have springtime in your heart and to be an Easter people.
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Sister Ann Marie WainrightSister Ann Marie Wainright is a Benedictine Sister of St. Scholastica Monastery in Duluth, Minnesota. Originally from New Orleans, Louisiana, she worked as a CPA for many years before earning dual masters degrees in counseling and pastoral studies. Sister Ann Marie is interested how people encounter God in their daily lives and how they use their faith and spirituality in meeting difficult challenges. View all of Sister Ann Marie’s blogs. |