For the most part, February 2024 was my kind of winter. 50, 60, or even 70-degree days and lots of sunshine. Someone online posted, “Midwesterners are fundamentally better people when it’s 50 degrees and sunny in February.” Based on my non-scientific research and attitude, it’s true.
By February, the joy of the first snow has melted, and the only thing we wish to measure is the growing minutes of sunlight, giving us hope that something beautiful is on the horizon – spring.
But wise and good people remind me not to rush to spring and miss the gifts of the winter – a slower pace, cozy comforts, warm layers, and the enchanting beauty of snow gently falling. As spring allergies soar early this year, we also remember with each sneeze that a good, long, cold winter lessens our spring allergy misery. There are gifts in each season of our life if we recognize and receive them.
The season of Lent is such a season. The invitation to walk our wilderness journeys with Jesus these 40 days offers its own gifts. We’re invited to name and face the lesser loves that have become our first love instead of the Lord. We commit to subtracting or adding habits and practices to carve out more space for the Spirit to work in our lives. We confront the excesses and the attitudes that take rather than give life for us and others. We listen to Jesus in fresh ways as he calls us yet again to surrender our ways to his ways and set our minds on things above, not things of earth.
Each year, I must relearn the lessons of winter. Each year, I must relearn the lessons of Lent.
May this March find us eager and willing students, ready to learn whatever God wishes to teach us in this season. I’ll be honest – I hope it doesn’t involve more snow, but if it does, may we recognize and receive the gifts of winter and Lent, which help us embrace the gifts of spring and Easter with more profound gratitude.
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