The February Thaw

The February thaw has come! The greens of the daffodils are beginning to sprout in some yards; crocuses are ready to pop; and the tiniest of buds are beginning to form on the trees and bushes. The warmth of the sun, if not the air, is evidence that winter is being pushed aside and spring is becoming impatient to show herself. And we cheer.

Well, I cheer. Are you cheering? The bright sun's warmth pouring through my windows brings a sense of comfort and a stirring in my soul to get moving. I am making spring cleaning lists and lists of projects I want to see completed this summer. I find myself walking outside just to go out for a minute, something I would not do if the temps dropped just a few degrees. Checking for the green flowers poking up is becoming a daily ritual again as I long for some evidence that this is real. But alas, I have lived long enough to know that this is normally just a preview of what lies several weeks into the future. Winter has not played her last note, not yet.

This little pause in winter reminds me of the moments of preview our gracious Lord during this winter here. This world is cold and dark compared to the glory that awaits us in eternity. There are moments when we step closer and "feel" the warmth of Eternity's Son. The mother receiving eye contact from her child who is autistic finds in that moment the ability to see beneath the disability to the boy she knows he really is, the child who will stand with her on the other side of this winter world. The daughter whose mother is lost in the secret places of dementia hears her name called and she listens as the old woman relives a precious moment from the daughter's childhood, and she remembers the mother who loved her and looks to the day when they, together, will stand before Jesus in wholeness of body and mind. The couple who have suffered through years of humiliation of unwanted barrenness peering into the eyes of the tiny child just placed in their arms, find the moment of eternity's breeze blow across their lives as they commit themselves to this child's life. The single person nearing forty years of age with no sense of being called to singleness but never quite making that connection, until now, as she stands at the altar and pledges her life to the man standing with her, peeks also to the coming wedding feast of the Bridegroom who is worthy of our waiting.

But there are smaller moments that breathe with eternity's life and give us a moment of reality. For we know that this world is really just a shadow of what is to come. I am thinking of small moments like the most amazing colors in the sky at the perfect sunset; the glowing blue of the ice in a glacier crevice; the soft, full scent of the first summer rose; the clean waking fullness of a lung filled with crisp autumn air; or the shimmer of the first snow through the delighted eyes of a small child. It's so easy (at least for me) to get caught up in the day to day routines and headaches that I forget that this is just a moment and the real thing is yet to come. Then He offers me a preview of what is to come. He pulls the curtain of eternity aside for just a breath and I remember Isaiah as he sees the train and hears the call; Ezekiel as he struggles to explain what he has seen at all; John writing of the rainbow encircling the throne and the crowns laying at its foot; and my heart leans toward that, longs for the fullness of what lies ahead, and aches with the desire to be there. And then the curtain falls and today becomes my moment and I know, that just like the February thaw will surely give way to the cold days again, yet spring is coming; so also will this winter give way to the new day when I step into eternity and meet my Savior. Are you longing for the end of winter or have you forgotten that it will end, some day, when the Father says "now"?