The Harvest of Winter

Does anything really happen in all this waiting?

Photo by Ray Hennessy on Unsplash

The mountains in winter offer an invitation to consider what happens now in a stark way. Everything in our mountain town has slowed down to a crawl. The tourists have left. Some shops are closed now. A few signs hang on resturant windows saying, “ Will Re-open in Spring.”

In my glass tree house where I sit each cold morning, I turn the heat up as the temperature has done down. Frost is on the windows and as the heat inside this space rises, the windows drip with moisture revealing the gray of the outside world.

What really happens in winter? What happens in us in the wintering of our lives?

One of my favorite writers, Gerald May puts the works of winter this way:

“Deer and rabbits quiet, fish and frogs and turtles nearly frozen, snakes holed up, summer birds gone away and winter birds now here, trees black and bare, seeds and cocoons and grubs and ciscada larvae and everything undergound., deep inside, down and in, where you cannot see the life happening. Life is rich in the time of keeping still, sap flowing, cells curing, change taking place….Inside us all, in depths of our inters, things are going on, things we will have no clue of until spring comes and perhaps, not even then.” (As quoted in The Lazarus Life) by me.)

Wintering offers the world a needed time of not growing, not expanding; not exploiting it’s full beauty.

My dear friend is wintering. She’s is in her nineties. She is feeling the collective springs, summers and falls of all of her many, many years. It is hard for me to watch her winter when I want her to come back to the spring of our wonderful conversations on her back porch. I do not want her to winter. But, as I listen deeply to her, I can hear her tell me that she, too is ready for the winter of her life. A part of the work of winter is the letting go of all we cannot sustain—all that we cannot will ourselves onward any more. In winter, we learn the power of waiting—or we do not learn it at all.

It is a myth to act like winter will not do its work. Winter is one of the eccleastical seasons promised us in the wisdom literature and sacred writings. Winter will come to all of us and now in the mountains where I live, winter is here.

What really happens though in the long, cold wintering? As I survey my inner landscape, I’m well aware of a grief that has taken hold. So much loss and giving up and anticipating my friend’s winter departure stirs up so much that I want to be settled inside.

Wait. Wait. Wait.

The Lingering Jesus who never showed up in the winter of Lazarus’ winter makes me upset. Why does God linger with our heartfelt prayers and make us wait so long?

I think in winter, our pressing questions need to pause. Questions and so many of them, is really the work of spring—clearing out this; throwing away the piles of twigs that have gathered in places they do not need to be. In winter, even the questions can rest.

Winter is the time of acceptance. It was Amy Carmichael who wrote these haunting, yet beautiful words while parazalized in her bed: “In acceptanc, there is peace.” That’s it— in the winter of our lives and the forests and vales and frozen lakes and all the hoary frosts—we are invited to accept. To accept the winter—and all that is happening deep in the mysteries of life where we cannot see.

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The ministry of words is a phrase that someone who subscribes to this Substack offered me. He told me that my writing is a ministry of words. In the winter of my vocation, I’m letting go of what I am choosing to give up. I’m wintering in my leading. I’m wintering in my speaking. I’m wintering in my doing.

I’ve done alot in the many springs, summers and falls of my life. Haven’t you? It’s not about comparing what we have accomplished. It is about truly being who we have become—through all the many winters and seasons of our lives. My writing and specifically the invitation to say more in fewer words is this great inner work of poetry. Substack has become the one and only place where I both want and will to offer my work. It’s a safe place for me. I made the decision six months ago to move away from Facebook and I’m so glad I have. With the election gathering steam, I’m needing to just now be so available to all the angry voices these days.

Those who choose to subscribe here, help make this possible. I think, in all honesty, it’s a tangible way to say, “Steve, I appreciate your words—your ministry and I hope you will continue to offer me words I want to hear.”

Here’s a way you might consider offering a GIFT of a Subscription to someone you’d like to join you on this journey. It’s a way to offer a subscription to a friend or family member. Use this button to do that and it’s taken care of for you and your friend. The gift of a subscription is a way to say, “Hey, read this with me and let’s talk about this the next time we are together.”

Here’s a poem I’ve worked on to share in fewer words than what I have said above. In Substack, the poems I write are for those who are “Paid Subscribers”. Everyone gets the reflections, but only those in this inner circle get the poems. Why? Because my poems are tender to me and as I write more and more, I’m building my confidence and my voice. Thanks for understanding.