the wonderful season

I took this picture while hiking with some wonderful brothers and sisters recently (thanks Jericho, for letting us tag along) up in Grayson Highlands State Park and it was amazing the beauty that was there. The wild pony standing was the mother of the one laying down in the background. Beside them was a very pregnant pony and she would let you feel her belly and the baby inside. The baby actually kicked. How incredible!
It was amazing, a Fall morning with heavy fog and cool air all around, a time of year seen as a time when things begin to die, there is the promise of new life right inside.
i think that Fall is one of the most beautiful times of the year. It is actually my favorite time of the year, primarily because of the vibrant colors all around and the cool air.
Living close to the Blue Ridge Mountains, i see thousands of cars every Fall that head toward the hills to view the magnificent trees cloaked with red and yellow and brown and orange of all different shades contrasting with the green of evergreens trees and sometimes gray and sometimes blue skies.
i believe God designed all seasons for many reasons, one being to remind us of the seasons in our own lives. Leaves on trees do not simply die and Fall off, they go out in a wonderful blaze of glory that celebrates both the life that it lived and the God who created it. We do not see everything simply stop, we see preparation for the Winter and in the squirrels, and we see preparation for the Spring in the seeds and young plants provided with a warm leaf blanket to protect them from the cold Winter ahead, give them the nutrients to start off the Spring healthy and ready to start the business of growing into beautiful flowers and giant trees. These leaves Fall and prepare the soil to be a healthy place for next year’s new growth to thrive. For next year to be successful, it needs the aid of these leaves to help protect and fertilize. It also depends on them giving up their lofty position to accomplish this.
Every living thing made by the creator was made to be born, to live and to die and in all these phases fulfill a purpose. Those being born shows a promise of a new life, the buds on trees and flower bushes lets all creation know that the Creator is still creating. Throughout life, there are certain properties that every little thing is supposed to use to accomplish many things; the most important is to propagate. In their dying they prepare the way for the new life to come.
Fall is not a sign of death to come, but a celebration of a life lived.
At different times we experience Fall. The time we most think of is when someone we love is near the end of their life. These are beautiful times meant for reflection on the blessing of the individual and it is a time to dream about what wonderful things will come about in the next season, we need to be looking to these things or else we die with them as does the promise of tomorrow. There are other times: when a relationship ends, when a group you belonged to passes its time of usefulness, when an ideal or perspective that you held so dear faces a new reality, a new world in which new ideals and perspectives are needed. You may look back at these things and have regrets about them. You may feel an obligation to hold on to it, whatever it is. You may feel an undying devotion to what has been and feel that there is nothing that can replace it. Whatever you feel about it, know this: it was incredibly important that it be a part of your life and God has used it in incredible ways, many if which you will only understand when you cross from your final Winter into your eternal Spring. God planned that it be in your life for a while to prepare you for the next while. In one way or another, it made possible your next Spring.
God did not intend for His creation to remain as is, He created it to be constantly regenerated, reborn, and for this to be done things have to die. For us to be born again, we had to die. For our new life, Christ had to die. For God’s new kingdom to be established, the old had to pass away. For my married life to begin, my single life had to die. If you don’t see the comparison, i moved from one important part of my life that God had intended i go through and moved to another that God desired and led me to so that i could do wonderful things. i was also supposed to feel discontent with the status of my life as a single fellow so that i would have a desire for another. i am grateful for that old life and the adventures that came about during that phase and realize how important it was. Churches that i used to be a part of were incredibly important for me and brought many blessings, but i was intended to go beyond that and experience new things to prepare me for more.
It is also the case that when i, in a season of life that God planned for me to be in, mess it all up and it is necessary that it go through its own Fall and Winter so that from its death a new Spring may come about and with it the new life with all of the wonderful possibilities of things God has in store.

God, remind me of life every time i look at your hills and trees and the color covering it all. And may i be thankful for it.

raymond, a child of the King