Depending upon where you live, with winter so close, your trees may be barren, your lawn a dormant brown, and the shrubs and flowers look dead. But far more is taking place than what meets the eye. During the winter months, the nutrients that the trees, flowers, and plants use are being resourced into different areas, such as for thickening the tree bark or for preparing the plant or flower for new growth and blooming. Unless this takes place, the trees and plants will not become what they’re supposed to be.
So what season of life are you in today? Ecclesiastes 3 begins with Solomon’s words of wisdom: “To everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven. A time to plant, and a time to harvest…a time to break down, and a time to build up…a time to mourn, and a time to dance…a time to keep silence, and a time to speak.” Too often we fail to understand this principle that we are in a season right now, and God has a purpose for this time in our lives. If we don’t recognize the season we’re in, we’re bound to miss the purpose it is meant to serve as well as miss how it should be preparing us for the next season of our lives.
While we may wish we were in a blooming season or a harvesting season with things always going our way, some seasons are challenging and difficult. You may be going through a stormy winter season right now. You may be raising children on your own, or going through a divorce, or walking through a season of illness. Recognize that it’s a season, that it’s where God has you right now, and that God wants to use everything in this season to keep you moving toward His purpose for your life. Tell yourself that if you’ll be your best as you go through it, you’ll get to where you need to be.
Be careful to not get stuck in a past season, wishing you could stay there in what you enjoyed or dwelling on pains and regrets that happened there. You have to recognize that people change, situations change, and if you don’t truly live in your present season, you’re not going to get to the new season God has for you. You have to embrace the season, to find out what the season has for you, and to be the very best you can be. Don’t waste the season. Squeeze out of it everything you can. Make the changes in your life, move forward, and keep growing. God is going to take you through the right seasons in His time, and you are going to become everything God intends you to be.