Winter Springs Glorious Hope
“The winter prepares the earth for spring — so do afflictions sanctified prepare the soul for glory.” -Richard Sibbes, 17th Century Theologian
I know people who hate winter. I’m a Midwest transplant to the South, so it’s a bit relative for me. I do understand the resistance, however.
The cold, wet season drives us indoors. Toes and noses stay perpetually chilled. Darkness descends hours before bedtime.
Winter can seem like a waste of perfectly good days, tucked under a blanket of bleak hope until the first signs of spring. “Wake me when it’s warmer,” they say.
So, too, our suffering seems useless.
I’ve bristled against my own seasons of heavy affliction, wondering what good it’s possibly doing. My heart’s been tempted to become as brittle as ice-stooped branches. I've wanted to hide and emerge only when all was right in my world.
Maybe you can relate.
Unlike winter, the problem with long-term suffering is we don’t know when (or how or if) the season will end.
When we’re tempted to hibernate, how do we let God’s grace sanctify our afflictions for His glory?
These two truths continually turn my heart from embittered sufferer to peace-filled endurer:
Jesus is with us.
Jesus came to earth as God-in-the-flesh to sit with us in our suffering and ultimately rescue and redeem it all. Christ’s suffering on the cross is beyond what we can imagine, taking on our sin, our shame, and our pain.
The whole celebration of Christmas is Immanuel, God with us.
Jesus has not left us to suffer alone, but is well-acquainted with grief. And not just any grief, but our particular griefs — immense physical pain, rejection, loneliness, demands, death, and denials.
Even now, Jesus is interceding for us on the right hand of the Father (Romans 8:34), and He will return to make all things new (Revelation 21:3-5) — just like new life bursting through the dormant ground every spring!
Eternity awaits.
God, in His compassionate wisdom, will transform our pain. Underneath the hard surface of this world, suffering is doing its work for a glorious end, just as seeds germinate in winter’s deep underground preparing for spring’s beauty.
Today’s afflictions are not the final chapter.
We suffer as Christ did, but the Bible tells us we are also co-heirs in glory with Him (Romans 8:17)! Though our spiritual winters persist, our trials are called “light and momentary troubles” that result in incomparable glory (2 Corinthians 4:17).
Our afflictions in and of themselves may not serve a purpose in eternity, but when our suffering makes us more like Jesus, our souls are preparing for glory. We are burrowing deep roots of faith and budding fresh stems of righteousness.
