Budding Life

This tree lives across my street and the weather behind it is indicative of this spring...gloomy. This spring, I am watching this tree everyday for the life that is sprouting from it because this spring that life represents hope in a very personal way. The neighbor who lived in that house passed away on Good Friday, which was also her birthday. Her life and her presence made an impact here that is heavily felt as loss. She remodeled her yard, paid big money to landscape 3 years ago, because as she said, "why not!" she paid extra for this tree to be a bigger, more mature version of itself so that in 3 years {rather than 10} it would be a stunner. That year is here and she isn't here to enjoy the budding branches. But I am. It is hard to be left behind with memories and an ache in my heart. This sweet neighbor may have accepted Jesus in the last minutes of her life, she may be dancing in heaven right now with beautiful spring unfolding in perfection...can you even imagine it?

Regardless of the weather that is ushering this next season, those branches continue to produce green buds that are beginning to unfurl their beauty. I am so grateful for the small quiet gifts of beauty that God gives us in this imperfect world, rememberances of grace and a foretaste of the majesty to come.

JOY in the Lord

Habakkuk 3:17-19

Though the fig tree does not bud

and there are no grapes on the vine,

though the olive crop fails

and the fields produce no food,

though there are no sheep in the pen

and no cattle in the stalls,

YET I will REJOICE in the LORD.

I will be JOYFUL in God my SAVIOR.

The SOVEREIGN Lord is my STRENGTH;

He makes my feet like the feet of the deer

He enables me to go on the heights.

Adrian Rogers says that he doesn't feel that there's any higher praise in the entire Bible than this prayer in Habakkuk 3. (only a portion of it is above) It's a profound praise - absolutely, totally profound. It's a prayer with praise that is full of rejoicing, a joy that endures no matter what comes. That's how I stay together when the world comes apart. Where do I get JOY? Not in all the things of this world that can fail me. I get my joy in the Lord.