The seasons are changing, summer has given way to fall. The once green, healthy leaves on the trees now are a brownish yellow and they cover the yard(I probably should be raking). The trees stand uncovered ready for the cold blasts of winter that are certainly on the way. Baseball has given way to football, for Viking's fans we endure and begin to already look to next year.
I believe there is a spiritual picture in the changing seasons that is so obvious we often miss it, God works in our lives in seasons. Every season is important and necessary for to us to bear spiritual fruit.
We have seasons of rest, re-staging in our lives, maybe some pruning, like winter. Our role in the winter is to abide.
We have seasons of new spiritual growth, vibrant life appears, like in the spring, our role is to abide.
We have seasons of spiritual maturity, they often involve discipline, pain and heat like the summer. We trust, our role is to abide.
We have seasons of bearing fruit, we experience the harvest, fall...our role is to abide.
As the seasons change around us, we for some reason do not expect our spiritual seasons to change. We expect a continual harvest,it ends. In the midst of pruning and discipline we think it will never end, yet the seasons change. Each season in our lives is designed by our loving God to bring us to maturity in Christ, our role is to abide. To abide; to dwell, to tarry, to live, to rest, to be at home in Christ. Our role is to surrender, to walk in the Spirit....simply to abide.
Whatever season you are in today, decide to look to God and rest in His grace, trust Him, His plan is for our good and His glory.
For all the Vikings fans we can celebrate yesterday's victory and look forward to this week's game(wait a bye week)...next week's game, enjoying the football season as it unfolds with the ups, downs, highs and lows...rather than looking to next year,we can just enjoy the moments of this season.
