I hate winter!
It’s no surprise to anyone who knows me, given the fact that I usually start asking or a pair of socks and a blanket once it hits 60 degrees. It might be another story if I had a little get away cottage perched on a snow covered mountain that I could ski down every day. Sadly, I live in middle Tennessee, where people start stocking up at the grocery store and canceling school at the CHANCE of an inch of snow.
Another reason that I am not too fond of the colder months is that there is a blanket of gray that hovers over the skies, one that seems to find a breach straight into my heart. I think some might refer to it as seasonal depression. This year has been no exception. As I reflect not only on the condition of my heart, but of my whole being this winter, this seems to be the prognosis…
I have forgotten.
I have walked away without realizing it.
I have shut down.
I have become numb…again.
To what?
To something so simple, a child can grasp it AND something so complex, the most intelligent minds in the human race will never exhaust their research.
Yes, they are one in the same. And my heart is frozen to it.
Can you guess what it is??
It is simple truth of the Gospel… the loving reality that a Father would make the ultimate sacrifice to wash my hands clean of sin upon sin upon sin.
In the South it’s pretty much common knowledge. Everyone knows the story. And honestly, that might be the problem. The story has been fed to the majority of us since we were infants, and somewhere along the way it lost it’s majesty, it’s intrigue, it’s fullness, and simply became a story.
Have you ever heard of background syndrome? (I honestly don’t know if this is what it’s actually called, but it’s what I’ve always referred to it as.) It’s the idea that we become numb to God’s creation because we see it so often. For example, the stars or the mountains… It’s so easy to think of them just a backdrop, some prop used on a Hollywood movie set. I mean they are so far away and you can’t touch them…It makes since.
And that’s exactly what has happened!
But God … Yes, thankfully, there’s a BUT:
“But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved…” – Ephesians 2:4-5
Praise God for his intervention, for that “but” because left alone, I don’t know that I would get out of bed in the morning. He has “made US alive TOGETHER.” I so often forget (especially in the winter) that I am NOT alone. So this is my plea, this is my prayer for myself and for all others that are struggling with the numbness of these winter months.
God,
Allow me to feel … to see the glory of the stars and the mountains and all of your creation and be completely in awe by it. Allow me to be touched, filled, restored by the love of the Gospel! Remind me EVERY day when I wake up that you are WITH me and you are FOR me. Allow the numbness of the winter to pass. May joy, may light, may warmth fill my soul!
