Winter Days of Grace

The beginning of the winter season in Colorado is truly magical. There is an excited quiet that settles over the valley as fresh snow begins to fall, bulky sweaters are put back into the wardrobe rotation, and Christmas lights shimmer everywhere. There are picturesque small-town holiday parades and local holiday craft fairs. Our family has new traditions we love like making snow ice cream out of the first good snow and building a small ski hill in our backyard. There is joy in abundance.

But the holidays end and the winter remains. The snow continues to fall but it quickly begins to lose its novelty to the frigid cold. The short days go dark as Christmas lights are taken down and the amount of clothing children require to go outside is as abominable as the snowmen they want to build.

I’ve written about the January blues before, but I wanted to revisit it again, even though we are now safely in the month of March. This past January was the first time I had a solid group of mom friends in my life, an answer to years of prayers. We approached January like we were going to battle, knowing each of us had our own struggles with this unending month of cold and despair. We encouraged each other daily, supported one another through the dreary days, and in one impressive emotional breakdown (courtesy of yours truly) readily stepped in to bear the burdens each other bore.

January 31st was a day of celebration. So many excited memes were exchanged in our group text to commemorate the survival of another long winter month. I approached February with new excitement and felt hopeful for the days ahead, thinking the worst of my worries were behind me.

Except the cold and ice were still there. The dreariness of the days hadn’t quite let up yet. The February sun still set far too early for my liking. Our family had colds at the beginning of the month and norovirus at the end. I had arrived at the place I thought would relieve me of my troubles only to find myself trudging through the same mess.

A sweet friend pointed out the obvious - I had put my hope in the wrong thing and it wasn’t able to bear the weight of it. I had been longing for January to end so badly I had forgotten that the bitter cold and grey would still be my close companions for at least a few more months.

Similarly, I’ve been tending to another seed of discontentment in my motherhood. We have been in the little years for four years now. We are currently in the thick of it with a sassy four-year-old with big opinions and a mule-headed two-year-old who has a tendency to fall off of furniture. We still don’t sleep fully through the night and have discipline issues we will be working on for eons. Our house is a constant disaster, and while we pick our battles carefully, the days are full of them. Eating 3 bites of dinner, wearing pants in public, and not eating crayons are the current hills I’m willing to die on and die on them I might.

But I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. I feel it in my bones that this season is not going to last forever. The middle years are on the horizon and they look so beautiful. I dream about the family camping trips, skiing with the kids on the weekends, and having conversations that don’t automatically result in a tantrum. I see my friends with older kids and practically glow green with envy.

I’ve been longing so deeply for the next season that I have added to the weariness of the current season tenfold. If my recent folly of putting my hope in winter ending has taught me anything, it’s that the next season will not solve all my problems. Life will change, sure, but it will always hold its challenges. No season will be perfect and while it’s fine to get excited for things to come, it is quite another thing to hold on to the hope that it will answer every unfulfilled desire in our hearts.

So how do we walk through the tough seasons biblically? How do we endure the long winters and exhausting little years? How do we weed out the seeds of discontentment before they take root even when their siren song is calling to us?

The answer is grace. God’s grace thrives in the wintery seasons of our lives. It is not only found on perfect weather days with perfect family outings in moments devoid of tantrums. It is not found more in one season of motherhood than the other.

Grace is the gifted lifeblood believers can cling to with every breath we take on Earth. It readily meets us in our deepest despair. It walks alongside us on the longest nights. It finds us when our bodies, hearts, and minds are utterly weary.

Let’s take a moment to rest in an overly familiar passage of Scripture. You likely know these few verses well, but don’t let familiarity take away from the jaw-dropping, stunning truth they hold:

“Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.” 1 Corinthians 12:7b-10

These words from Paul were not spoken in a season where it was sunny with a high of 75. They were spoken when he was in the trenches. He begged God to take away that which tormented him, but God resolutely reminded him that even when Paul’s seasons of life were painfully challenging, God’s grace was sufficient. By this grace, Paul was able to recognize that his seasons of hardship and difficulties were not times to despair but to rejoice! Not because he could just suck it up and get through it, but because God was faithful to remind him that these are the seasons where his grace shines brightest.

As we read through the Scriptures, we see that these seasons are also purposeful. Read what King Solomon wrote in Ecclesiastes:

“When times are good, be happy; but when times are bad, consider this: God has made the one as well as the other.” Ecclesiastes 7:14

God has masterfully orchestrated every day we live. He has created these hard seasons for a purpose. There is beauty in both good and bad days. These days are not without their reason. They are moments to glorify the God who brought you into them in the first place.

If you find yourself in a wintery season like myself, don’t despair. God has not left you. His grace is sufficient to see you through. The daunting seasons we meet in life will not last forever. But while they linger, seek his grace. Let the trials and challenges sow seeds of dependence on our Savior. May God’s grace prove sufficient in every winter you meet.