Autumn has always been my favorite. There are so many things about it that I love: rich colors, changing leaves, sunny days with cool evenings, crisp air, crunching leaves, dancing bonfires, cozy sweaters, flannel pajamas, apple orchards, football games, pumpkin spice, my birthday…
Admittedly, this year, I’ve struggled a bit to appreciate the season. It’s as if fall has a death-shadow cast over it. Every falling leaf reminds me that life must end; that each autumn soon gives way to winter. And winter turns the world brown. Trees become skeletons with a thousand fingers casting long, eerie shadows from the light of a now-distant sun. And for a season, the earth lies dormant and cold. If winter is the death, then autumn is the dying.
Ironically, it is in that dying that autumn’s beauty is revealed.
I suppose each season brings it’s own special kind of beauty, if you care to see it. For instance, the stillness of winter is but an illusion. For hidden away from view, underneath the death and decay of winter, lie the seeds that fell in autumn. The very seeds that will burst forth into new life, come spring.
The seed has nothing to fear as it falls to the ground, for it knows that unless it dies, it cannot bring new life. (John 12:24) What one calls being buried, another calls being planted. What’s more, God has allowed us a glimpse of His perspective on the autumn of our lives. For those who have died in Christ, scripture calls death “precious” in the eyes of God. (Psalm 116:15) It is but the grand reunion of a weary traveler arriving home. To the home for which he was created. The Father sees the beauty of His child being transformed until, at last, the fingers of this life release him from their bony grasp and let him drift into the waiting arms of Jesus. Death, our final enemy, has already been defeated. And so, hidden away from our view, death bursts forth into life everlasting.
It is in the dying that the gospel’s beauty is revealed.
But for those of us that remain, the beauty of autumn surrenders itself to the cruelty of winter. This barren wasteland seems to go on forever as we await the coming spring. The dismal shadows fall over us and the light of the Son may often seem distant. We cannot see what is happening beyond the veil. And for a season, life feels dormant and ugly and cold, like a snowless winter.
But oh, my friends, we must not despair! Hold on to hope. For after every winter comes the spring.
And spring brings resurrection.
October 2022