In the Light of the Bonfire...

I used to spend hours watching my grandmother tend to her flower garden. She'd lug her water hose all across the yard with her over-exuberant collie barking and chasing it. On our knees for hours, she would carefully pick out the weeds, tenderly grazing past the shoots that to my unknowing eyes, appeared uglier than the desired flower. She would tell me about each juniper, hollyhock, crepe myrtle, orchid, foxglove, azalea, or rosebush, sowing the latin name of each piece of Georgian flora into my eager mind. In the spring and summers, we would await the blooming of each flower, and grandmom would show me daily, like a present, which one bloomed overnight. Her yard was a medley of heavenly colors, smells, and sounds. No one in the neighborhood held a candle to the wild assortment that grew happily under her care. Everything thrived in the summer. The days were long and the nights resonated with the glory of the day and the hope of warm evenings to bask in growth and beauty. The summer doesn't last though and I felt the sadness grow as the days shortened. An end to what I felt was life was coming. My grandmother felt it too, but instead of mourning, she prepared. She brought in all her fragile, tropical plants, placing them on handmade racks in her greenhouse. The leaves from the live oaks and cherry trees fell and the days shortened. A crisp, clean atmosphere burned our throats. Winter chilled and my grandmother pulled out her pruning shears. Everything went dormant. Those crepe myrtles became odd-looking sticks that protruded awkwardly out of layers of mulch and pine-straw. Grandmom would chop and hack and cut until I was certain that none of it would grow back the next spring. I nearly wept when she cut stalks off of my favorite climbing rose. “You want it to bloom and grow, don't you?” she'd say to my protests. “Uh huh.” I'd manage. “Then let me get rid of what's not needed and what's in the way. I do this every year and I know what I'm doing. I don't prune just for the sake of pruning. Come spring, you'll see.”

It's winter. So gather up those fallen branches, pile them high, then burn them all. Let the dust settle and wait for spring when you can till all those ashes into fertile soil that will soon bear fruit. These long nights and short, dark days will soon be over. Spring, oh glorious Spring, is coming. So raise your Ebenezer stone and remember that "He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion in Christ Jesus." For now, though, wait.

"There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under the heavens:
a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,
a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,
a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace." - Eccl 3:1-8