To everything there is a season

I love summer. I have many great memories of summers. I had spent years on the boat, enjoying my summers. I have so many memories of people who loved me, fed me, corrected me, loved me. Summertime sunshine, vacations, swimming, sun tans. Everyone who knows me now, knows how much I have fallen in love really hot weather (it reminds me of Haiti). But I’m learning to love all the seasons for a lot of different reasons.

But this time of year, oh it’s glorious. Just as spring is a time of rebirth, and beautiful colors of pinks and yellows and purples and millions of shades of bright green sprouting from the earth, fall has just a wide array of God’s palette selected from a different spectrum on the color wheel.

The fall brings warm fires, and sweatshirts, and jeans, and shoes (well, the shoes part stinks but there is nothing like a cute pair of boots!). The harvest of seeds planted for in the spring and cared for in the summer is a beautiful bounty of God’s provision.

It reminds me of Galatians 6:9 which God has been putting in front of me ALL the time lately, He must be trying to tell me something… haha

I think of the seasons in our walk.

Winter, rest, prayer, God asks us to be still. Rest is needed (I hate rest like a 4 year old hates naps, they are necessary, but not always enjoyed!)

Spring… a time of rebirth, oh Easter comes in the spring. Our Savior has risen! I think about how many kids I work with and how excited they are to learn and know Jesus, no matter what time of the year it is.

Summer… oh there is hard work in summer, weeding and pruning, it’s hot, sweaty, and dirty. We become very thirsty and if we don’t drink, we will die. If we don’t drink in Jesus, we will perish. And just like the thirst of our body, we must drink before we realize we need it or we are already dehydrated.

Fall… all that hard work! The payoff! HARVEST! We see lives changed with Christ! Our own heart overflows with His goodness! It is a beautiful time. A time that we remember as we start the cycle all over again!

I just have to say, I love Youth Ministry. It’s hard. I cry a lot of tears! I cry over the broken, I cry in great sadness when they wander, I cry in rejoicedness (it’s a word!! At least in my mind) when they return! I cry when they share great news with me!

I think about how my heart overflows with love for others and for Jesus because of all the seasons in my life. It amazes me that God would choose to love me, that He believes I am beautiful, that He works in my heart, and comforts me, that He corrects me with a loving hand.

I am thankful.

Let us never grow weary, and when I do, let me find my strength in You, my loving Father.

Gal 6:9 Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.

2 Cor 12:9 But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.

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