Waiting

I must admit that spring is my least favorite season. Why? Just look at the picture above. In spring the snow has melted leaving flattened grasses and leaves that have all colour drained out of them from the long prairie winter. The skies are often a washed-out dull grey and cloudy. The plants that have survived the sleepy dormancy of winter are in the process of regenerating, sending out new roots and shoots, forming new buds holding the promise of green leaves and blossoms and fruit. But it “looks” like this. The nights are still too cold to transplant any of those plants I started indoors a month ago. The spring winds have a harsh bite requiring me to wear warm boots and jacket when I venture out to do chores. Everywhere I look is brown and grey and dirty. It’s disheartening. I am the kind of person that needs colour, contrast, blinding sunrises and warm sunsets. The greys that bleed into greys in the sky, the browns that blend into browns of dead grasses and brittle fallen branches and damp leaves… it’s too much of one tone, one colour, one feeling…waiting.

When I reflect on my gardens in the spring, I feel in my soul that I am forced to reflect on my life and faith journey as well. It seems that the growing of my faith has been a process of waiting. There is certainly the breathless anticipation found in waiting for a new relationship, a new baby, a new job, a new adventure. There is also the agonizing limbo found in waiting for a test result, a diagnosis, a surgery, a recovery. I’m breathlessly waiting for the weather to warm up and the leaves to burst forth on the trees and for there to be colour once again in the garden. For spring rains to soak into the thirsty soil and wash everything clean of road dust and snow mould. Both of these opposing times of waiting – the anticipation and the limbo – require trust in God. On the surface I can’t see the new roots stretching out in the still chilled soil. I can’t “see” the green leaves or the red fruit of the raspberry plants when I look at them as they are right now.

There have been many times in my life when everything has seemed bleak and devoid of life or growth. Dried up, dusty, thirsty, dead, waiting…for the sun, warmth, water, colour, new life. My journey with God has taught me to trust that these things will happen even though I cannot “see” them in the moment. God has been faithful in the “spring” places of my life to bring reminders to me – in the form of a piece of music, a line in a poem, art, prayer, a phone call from a family member, a meal with friends, the plants in my garden – that what looks “dead” actually holds new life. My perception of what I “see” is not always what is or could be. I grow weary of waiting. Do you as well?

And yet… and yet. In that breathless moment of waiting, hoping, trusting, the Holy Spirit breathes when I can’t seem to catch my breath. In my daily moments of weakness and brittle frailty, God is strong. Jesus reminds me that He conquered death. They are in my “now” and my “not yet”. They are in the waiting and help me to see that it is less a game and more of a process in the new growth of faith, each season, each year, each day.

• 

Isaiah 40:28-31 says, “Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. God will not grow tired or weary, and God’s understanding no one can fathom. God gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young people stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength.” May you find blessing in the waiting.