About 5 years ago my kiddos were romping through the back yard. Air rushed through my sons’ torn knee holes as they ran through the fallen leaves that winter had left behind. My daughter’s ponytail bounced around as she followed her brothers through an imaginary tale of finding hidden treasure.
“Argh,” they all shouted as though this made them officially pirates. Sometimes saying the words out loud allows our minds to connect with the story we are telling ourselves.
And then suddenly my daughter spots a glint of color between the brown, dry leaves. It’s a flower. Bright red. It’s slightly hidden in the dull backdrop of the ground, but the red is too vibrant to hide its beauty.

Why do we love Spring so much? Is it because of its beauty that springs forth from such a dark and dry landscape?
Is it because we’ve sat with longer and colder nights?
I wanted to share two things that Spring can teach us about trusting God in our lives.
Trusting God during winter is the first thing we can do.
In winter we close our blinds sooner and we shut down our day to day activities sooner. But so do the trees. They’ve lost their leaves. They’re shutting down until spring. Or are they?
The season of winter may seem longer and harder but it is a time for rest, preparation, and trusting God.
During winter we must trust like the trees. Sometimes we must lose our leaves in an act of trust that spring will in fact come again. We must trust the darker landscape because we know the God who knows the process. He created the process.
We must also understand that like the trees and the flowers, there is a time to shut down and rest. We as humans tend to go until we’ve run ourselves dry.
This idea of a tree resting and preparing for Spring began my research. I found this information about a bud’s dormancy:
Jonathan Landsman
They’re armored for what’s to come. They aren’t just shutting down willy nilly and hiding from the winter. They are armored. They’re waiting for what they know their creator will ultimately bring. Spring.
But if we are to look to the birds or to the lilies of the fields then we will see they pause. Winter may feel harsh, unproductive and cold. But if we are trusting God who created the winter and the spring then we can relax in knowing there is purpose to the cold.
Springtime is coming. It may not feel like you’ll see that flower blooming in the midst of the broken, crushed leaves of your life. But He who makes the promise is faithful.
“And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.”
Anais Nin
The second thing I want you to see that Spring can teach us is that there is also a time for growth.
Yes there are times we need to bundle up and trust the Savior through the hard, cold nights.
But there are also times where the dormancy is coming to an end. It is no longer time to hide or prepare.
It is time to burst through the dark landscape of this life and bring that color, beauty and wonder that only God himself can bring.
You see we can’t make ourselves bloom. We can’t muster up enough talent, enough beauty or enough strength to force ourselves to bloom during winter or spring.

We have the Spirit of God in our souls, in our lives.
For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God.
Ephesians 3:14-19
My kids didn’t just rush by this flower they saw in the yard.
It caused them to stop their playing. They came running to tell me of the beauty they found in the dark, dry places of our back yard.
So friend, as you dwell in seasons of winter or spring I pray that when you see life and beauty burst forth in your life that you can’t stay quiet. I pray that when we see God do the good work that he does, we will all pause our play and share with others the goodness and beauty of our Creator.
If this encourages you, can you share it with your friends? Or come join me over on Instagram where I share more encouraging words of how to Dwell with God through beauty, wonder and hospitality.