“For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven” Ecclesiastes 3:1

Fall is my favorite season. I love the colors, the foods, the clothes, and the weather. Every fall I look forward to decorating and displaying my pumpkins and eating way too much food.

Our first fall, I saved my pennies and went to the store to carefully select the perfect pumpkins. I washed them off and placed them next to my front door. The next morning I got my coffee and nestled onto the couch by the window to enjoy the colorful view when I noticed one of my pumpkins had a giant, ugly hole in it. I ran outside and caught a squirrel in the act of theft. He had eaten the hole in the pumpkin and was actually carrying my baby pumpkin down the sidewalk.

I cleaned up the mess and purchased new pumpkins. The same thing happened the next day.

I began to anticipate this battle each fall. A battle I dreaded. I fostered a new hatred for squirrels and for fall decorating. And suddenly a season that I had associated with such joy had a twinge of frustration associated with it.

On a walk recently I came upon a tree that was in transition. Hints of red shone through the vibrant, green ivy that climbed the tree. I began to contemplate the upcoming war with squirrels that I am sure to face and laughed to myself. The whole idea of going to war with squirrels and the emotions it brought to the surface is actually crazy.

The Lord began to speak to me about embracing the present. The current season. Even if that season is transition, itself.

Looking at that tree made me want for fall. Even the war on squirrels it may possess. It made me sad to say goodbye to summer.

All too often I try and push onward to whatever season is next. Or I try to hold on to a season that is over. I suppose it’s the ambiguity associated with change.

Each season of life comes with its colors. The bright, the ugly, the muted, and the mundane. The option to embrace each color – to learn from each moment, even the ugly ones – is a gift.

I hate transition and the lingering associated with “there, but not quite there yet”… but that’s life. It’s an illustration of the now and the not yet of the Kingdom of God.

Lord, teach me to relish all seasons of life and to uncover the lessons, even in transition.

“I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need.” Philippians 4:12

“Live in each season as it passes; breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit” –Henry David Thoreau