Paperwhites were emerging from their buried bulbs

We’ve had a few consecutive days here in Texas of rain, cold, and general lack of sunlight. We gardeners tend to get a little antsy about when Spring will finally arrive. We want to go play in the dirt! But when the soil is this saturated, digging in it will only compact it and ruin the structure of oxygen and microbes. Thankfully, today as I took out our kitchen compost, I realized that all this rain is doing something beautiful on its own.

Paperwhites were emerging from their buried bulbs. The greenery has been out for several weeks, but the flowers have been waiting for a good soaking. And other bulbs from the Narcissus family were sending up shoots of green leaves.

Sometimes what seems like a season of constant setbacks and bad surprises can be a season full of beautiful, good fruit…when you step back and look at it. The pain in the change and struggle makes it hard to see until afterward.

The problem with me is that I typically keep a running list in my mind of all that’s recently gone wrong, so as soon as something negative happens I pack it to the snowball of previous negatives, and it all seems ever-looming. Like that big boulder in Indiana Jones, tumbling down my path behind me, about to crush me.

But really it’s just a rainy day, and I’ll bet something good and beautiful is around the corner. The daffodils start to push through the soil in the dead of winter, when it seems everything is dead. They remind us that new life is coming soon — even that it is here, just below the surface. Horace Walpole said, “When people will not weed their own minds, they are apt to be overrun by nettles.” Reminds me of 2 Corinthians 10:5, “…we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.” Trust that every hardship is a season of growth, and let rainy days be rainy days. Look for the life!