Autumn in My Heart

Autumn is here. There's been frost a couple times, the temperature has dipped below freezing in the wee hours and we've seen our first flurries of snow. The poor cottonwood, who only wears her veil of green for such a short time, is almost completely a stick figure once again.  But her summer attire is beautiful, shimmery green. In my dreamy half sleep, her rustling leaves sound much like the rains of the Pacific Northwest, the sound carries through my open bedroom window, the prairie breezes never ceasing. 

Autumn.....achingly beautiful. Always reminding me of the ebb and flow of the seasons of life. The changes that are inevitable. Changes that are good and natural, yet I find I always want to hang onto the familiar. 

Young ladies growing up, growing good and sweet. It makes me happy......but a part of me wants to take them in my lap again, keep them small. My boys, who spend their afternoons running a log splitter, hauling wood, doing the work of little men. That makes me happy too, because I know they are growing strong and true.......but it seems like just a couple years ago they were nursing in my arms (they really love when I tell them that). 

My baby, weaned and potty trained, wearing little "piggle tails" traipsing about, singing songs, playing dollies.

Autumn....it means winter is coming, but for now the sky is vivid blue, the leaves crunch beneath our feet, and the air is crisp like the bite of a fresh apple. 

This land that Blue eyes loves, if nothing else, it will make me grow strong. The trees here are strong, they grow against all odds, bent from the wind. Their leaves only last a few short months. I think of the trees in the Pacific Northwest, they grow tall and quiet and majestic in the rain. In my heart I want to be like them, growing peacefully in the evergreen forest but sometimes I think that God has willed that I grow more like the trees here. Being refined through the winds, through life. But I would not complain "for can the pot say to the potter, Why hast thou made me thus and thus?" 

Then I think of a few of the most peaceful women that I have known and I see that they have gone through many trails in this life. They have learned obedience through the things they have suffered and rather than becoming bitter or selfish, they have clung more tightly to Jesus in their sorrow and learned to trust Him more. 

I am ever thankful for the example they have left me. 

O, how I want a heart that is good! That is soft and pliable in the hand of the potter. I want to sing with Fanny Crosby,"Thou my everlasting portion, more than friend or life to me; all along my pilgrim journey, Savior, let me walk with thee. Close to thee, close to thee, close to thee, close to thee. Not for ease or worldly pleasure, nor for fame my prayer shall be; Gladly will I toil and suffer, only let me walk with thee. Close to thee, close to thee....." 

Truly He is good and faithful. Even when things don't make sense from our perspective, if we trust Him still, He will lead us in paths of righteousness. "Surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever." Amen.