A friend of ours, in her eighties, was telling us the other day about the year she went to high school. “Those were good times. The war was over and we didn’t have a care in the world,” she remarked.
It got me thinking – nothing except heaven is going to last for eternity. There is no storm that doesn’t eventually give way to sunshine and rainbows. No dark night is endless, for every predictable sunrise declares a new beginning. Wars do end, earthquakes cease, volcanoes lose pressure and vent themselves of fuel and fire. Arguments fizzle out because nobody can remember anymore what it was even all about. It’s very difficult to keep a bad thing going.
People all over the world are facing all manner of trials. I am not minimising the struggle when I say that to give up in the middle is a deep and sorrowful shame, because it is not over until it is over. The turmoil will run it’s course and for those who are left standing, there will be a new day. For those who continue to hope and trust, keeping their chins up and their shoulders back, there will be opportunities to take hold of and a merciful chance to rebuild. Perhaps what was standing before the onslaught needed to be flattened, and instead of simply replicating the design, a grand reinvention can occur.
I am a born optimist. Maybe you are more of a pessimist, or you would rather call yourself a realist. Maybe my words make you fed up, but I have looked at the seeds in the cup of a poppy flower long since gone, and there is a promise of a field of poppies if I shake those seeds out of their ready, open windows onto prepared soil. The flower didn’t end when it came to an end. A whole new generation of wonder and life waits to be unleashed because that flower lived and bloomed and stood bravely through the seasons, never worrying about all the petals falling to the ground because a cup full of the potential for a million new petals was being created in the process.
Maybe it is endless car trouble. Perhaps it’s poor health, infertility, dysfunctional relationships, corrupt systems, betrayal, financial strain or just the sense that no matter how much you try to get on top of your work load, there will always be more waiting. Maybe you feel like far too much is being expected of you. Be encouraged by the pattern of things. A young girl and her family and friends once got to the other side of a horrendous war and found themselves revelling in the peace that we now take for granted. Whatever you are going through, the seasons are turning, the morning is coming. Allow the precious seeds to form and when the time is just right you’ll open up the windows of your brave and steadfast heart and plant a whole meadow of beauty right where you had begun to think it was all just loss and pitiful and meaningless.
Good times are coming.
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