Another incomplete thought...

[Tony]

Oh,

How my soul

Is so

Broken.

On the edge of the end of a season of death, of cold, of shadowy colors, I sit, and I wait, anxiously, for the air to warm, for the earth to thaw, for the rebirth of life and vitality. It is interesting that Jesus was born in the midst of a season of desolation and died in a season of rebirth. It seems that God performs a new creation every spring, bringing light to darkness, life to barren land, division between water and shore. Yet, I know that this cannot be true. The winter is part of creation too. Spring can only come if it is preceded by the cold winter. Creation is still alive. It builds and forms and changes because of what is happening now. I know that life can only be born out of the dead of this winter. 

I am still here.

I think of the word rebirth and immediately other words come to my mind: renovation, renewal, restoration-

Resurrection.

It seems so much easier, in the winter, to see the brokenness in the world. Maybe its because certain types of suffering and pain may become more tangible at times. Our hands get cold while we walk to our cars. No matter how hard we try,  its hard to keep our shoes clean when we walk through the streets. We know that there are people close to us who are suffering so much more than we are. We feel the cold. We can imagine what it would be like without gloves. We could feel it if we wanted to. We feel uncomfortable when brokenness looks us in the face and we recognize it in ourselves. 

God says to the animals, to the fish, to the birds, to Adam, to Eve: “Be fruitful and multiply.” 

Grow!

And so, God begins something. God creates a world that will grow, and change, and form, that can be built up, that can be torn down. I look like creation. The world was a child. I am a child. I grow. I learn. I change. And like the world, I am so broken. I am broken, and I know that my brokenness cannot fix brokenness. The brokenness in the world is my own brokenness. On my own, only winter will follow winter. The story from the fall seems to follow a pattern like this- brokenness leading to more brokenness. Then something happens. 

The Creator puts himself in the story.

In the death and desolation of the winter- in a barn, on the margins of the city, restoration is born. God becomes both author and character in the story. Jesus travels from town to town, preaching about a way of life that will transform the world. But, we are still broken- until the cross. On the cross, every brokenness, for every person, is washed away. Something else dies with Jesus. Out of death comes the possibility for life- renovation, renewal, restoration, resurrection. We are able to live a life of transformation because we have been transformed. We are creation and we have Good News. We are no longer broken. Our winter is over. Let us resurrect the world.

God, let us be your Good News to each other.