Faith's Autumn Dance

My sister, Faith, writes about autumn in a poignant sort of way. 


Autumn Dance

Heavy gray skies hang over head

While wild winds blow the crisp leaves

Into a frenzy making them

Leap and dance across the yard

Trash cans tumble noisily by while

Wisps of paper and other debris

Whip by in a hurry to meet its destination,

The air cools and the breezes become

More insistent; tugging branches

To and fro in a long-awaited autumn dance

There are a few red and golden leaves left, but soon

 The trees will shed their beauty and become skeletal

In their appearance-the heavy gray of the skies will turn

Cadaverous and the earth will sleep.

~Faith Stobbs

Autumn -- the herald of winter--- , and when the trees smugly discard their glory ....the backdrop of beauty takes a vertical plunge....No, autumn, though it is a beautiful send off, sometimes teases and needles me about this "cadaverous sleep" a-coming.  And when I am left there again-- dumbly gazing up at "skeletal trees", don't I believe, after all..............in spring?

But today, "Oh my goodness",..today I dread nothing at all-- All caught up in the brilliant, vibrant color --  this autumnal scene is playing out like some kind of supernova whose glorious finale is about to explode; this magnificent crescendo happening all around us in our little valley. 

I want to hang around in this "glory" and not peer through the golden leaves, and shiver at  what  could be just beyond my view.......could it be winter again??  

But, to see my winters as the time when life is rejuvenating just below the surface, this would be sweet---and not a time of death, nor something to dread.  In  HIS gentle kingdom there is nothing to dread at all.

Mistrust is quite wintery to me-- it's as if  the peace that I enjoy just peels away and I and my unbelief sit exposed.  And how silly, when our Father can always be trusted.

But, it seems like a Kingly grace and kindness that sets any trial, any set back, and momentary lapse of trust , or winter of heart always between an autumn and spring. 

 I hear that faith trusts the view beyond to Him who loves us best. It reconciles our blindness and shortsightedness to Him who can see to eternity and back.  I hear that faith never forgets about spring, where refreshing awaits with endless streams for the thirsty.

 20 Early on Sunday morning,^[a] while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and found that the stone had been rolled away from the entrance......................and "spring" came again.

How is The View?

My little room;  I sleep there, read there, think and have deep conversations there (prayer),  and sometimes leaping epiphanies.   Three windows give me a view of the field, the next farm, a little pond out back,  and a little mountain beyond.  Gosh, the windows were dirty this morning.  Webs had been weaved around about and dust had blown up from some previous storms and blurred my lovely view.  It's been that way for a while, until, I washed them all off.  How sweet to see out so clearly now!

                                            How sweet to see clearly.

 And the apostle Paul prayed for the Ephesians in his day like this:  I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people.  Ephesians 1:18.  I so want to see this clearly.

¹² For now we see in a mirror ^[a]dimly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I will know fully just as I also have been fully known. 1 Corinthians 13:12