From Winter to Spring



I love spring.  No, I really, really love spring.  I LOVE spring!  There's just something about going through a windy, harsh winter where everything turns brown and dies, to seeing blooms burst open, smelling the sweet, freshly mowed grass, and hearing all the different bird songs.  It's just beautiful watching the earth begin to live again.

And how can we not compare this new birth with the new birth of our Saviour?  It just doesn't seem possible to be able to watch the earth begin to live again without thinking of the day that Jesus was beaten, killed and withered, placed in the ground only to have it burst open three days later and our Rose of Sharon bloom again! 

I was on the road the other day, and thinking about how devastating it has been to lose my sister, how heartbroken my husband was to lose both his parents, and all the other losses we've had in the past few years.  And I began to think of people I know who have also experienced great losses in their lives.  And then a song came on the radio that was the first song I heard playing after my sister passed, so it became my song.  It was my song of loss, heartache, and despair.

The name of the song is "Worn". *  It begins "I'm tired I'm worn, My heart is heavy from the work it takes to keep on breathing." And as I was listening to the words again my mind began to wander back to the days of Christ, when the disciples and He lived together, ate together, rested together and worked together.  I began to think of the friendship that they must have developed.  How they rose each morning maybe being a little raucous (as young men together often are), laughing, joking and picking at one another.  Then maybe things slowed down as they began to prepare their meal and began to prepare for the lessons they would learn from the Master.
As they gathered round the table, or the campfire to break bread, the seriousness of the day enveloped them and their hearts became united and broken for the people they would encounter that day.  As they walked with Jesus down the road, their feet becoming covered in dust, they would hear Jesus speak.  "Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat....consider the ravens: for they neither sow nor reap....and God feedeth them:  how much more are ye better than the
fowls?"    As they walked along the way, talking, a voice was heard over their conversation.  They went to fetch the person who called out to Jesus, and Jesus asked the man what he wanted.  All he wanted was to be able to see again, so the disciples were witness to Jesus just speaking the miracle of sight.

It must have been such a closeness that only brothers can enjoy, to share in everything in life.  The hardships, the work, the fun, the excitement, the struggles were the things they experienced on a daily basis.  And even though Jesus tried to prepare them for their "winter", there was no way to really comprehend what lay ahead for them all.

The song continues, "My soul feels crushed by the weight of this world, And I know you can give me rest." At the onset of the end of their earthly relationship with Christ, the disciples must have been like ants when their home has been crushed by a footstep...confused, scared, scattered in different directions, not believing what was happening.  Their fear and despair must have been palatable.
They couldn't eat, they couldn't sleep, they could only see their whole world and everything they believed in coming to an end.  It's the shock of great loss that encompasses all of us.  They were living a nightmare.  They were seeing the Saviour of all mankind die.    They were losing hope when their Hope was taken down, lifeless from the cross.  They were seeing the One who talked of eternal life be put in a grave. 

"So I cry out with all that I have left, Let me see redemption win, Let me know the struggle ends, That you can mend a heart that's frail and torn.  I want to know a song can rise, From the ashes of a broken life, And all that's dead  inside has been reborn." 

This must have been their song, too....despair, defeat, death.  But yet, in that tiny room where they met in hiding,  there was a glimmer of belief, a tiny spark of hope.  What was it He said?  "Yet a little while, and the world seeth me no more; but ye see me:  because I live, ye shall live also."  Did he really mean what I think he meant?  Is it true?  And as they pondered these things, Mary Magdalene bursts through the door, her face shiny with tears, and babbling something about seeing Jesus!  While they were trying to understand it all and were whispering among themselves in order not to be found out, they hear a voice.  A voice that was as familiar to them as their own!  "Peace be unto you."

Stumbling over themselves, giddy with relief and joy, they were ecstatic!  It was true!!  It was all real!!  He lives!!  He lives again!!

John 8:51  Verily, verily, I say unto you, If a man keep my saying, he shall never see death.

*Worn, by Tenth Avenue North