What is it with springtime and baby animals? Have you ever thought about *why* so many (though not all) animals give birth to their young in spring? The timing of animals’ mating seasons (and therefore birthing seasons) is based instinctively on when will give their young the best bet for survival. For most animals, this means they give birth in spring, giving the babies the longest possible amount of time to grow and get strong enough to survive by the time winter comes around. How does this connect with life with God? Think back to your first days of faith – what did they feel like? Was it like spring – new life popping out everywhere; nourishment wherever you looked; warm, comforting breezes making you feel like all’s right with the world? Were you like a young animal, dependent on its mother for every aspect of survival? And have you experienced other seasons since those days? Were there hot summer days, full of hard work and bearing fruit? Were there autumn days of letting go? Were there long, silent winters in your soul? And when those other seasons have come (as they surely will, if they haven’t already!), how did the “spring” of your life with God prepare you for those harder, drier, more barren times? Have you tended to want to “get back” to that first flush of spring? What is it like to consider that these tougher seasons of faith are just as much a part of the journey (and that maybe you’re not doing something *wrong* if it feels like winter right now – it is just the season of your soul, a season God is sustaining you through, too, even though it may feel very different than those spring-breeze days)? And to consider that spring *will* come again – it always does! There is goodness happening deep in you, no matter what season it feels like you find yourself today. If you are in a darker, wintry season of your soul, could it be that there is new life forming, stirring in your depths, waiting for the right moment to emerge – that will give it exactly all that it needs to survive and grow strong before it’s tested? Can you call *this* season (whatever one your soul is in) good?

Posted by Jamie Bonilla at 2021-04-13 14:08:13 UTC