Tag: seeds

Divorce, Grief, Retirement, Seasons of Life, Transitions, TRIALS AND TRIBULATIONS, Widowhood

YOU WILL NOT BE BURNED

Deryn

2019-03-02 09.44.52For the past three weeks I have spoken about wind, how it disperses seed to grow, lifts us above our circumstances and give us energy to move forward.  Today I want to focus on fire which is also a necessary element to growth.  

There is a beautiful flower in Cape Town, in fact the national flower of South Africa, the Protea. This plant amongst other ‘fynbos’ plants requires fire before the seeds can germinate.  Fynbos needs to burn at least every decade to keep regenerating the species and the local ecosystem. Dormant seeds which may have been buried under the soil for a few years are triggered by the heat of the fire to stimulate growth. The fire burns out all the old undergrowth and seeds that have been carried away or buried by rodents, birds, ants and insects lie waiting and when the rain comes continue with the growth process. Depending on the heat of the fire, some may only be triggered to germinate after waiting fifty years! Fire can occur naturally with a lightning strike, accidentally with sun rays through a broken glass shard or deliberately with arson. Fires are unpredictable and so it is with the germination of different seeds after each fire and its intensity and how soon the rain falls after the fire! This is such a marvelous example of what is was like at Pentecost when the Holy Spirit arrived with wind and fire to empower the disciples after Jesus’ ascension into heaven and His continued work in the world today. They did not know what would happen next! Neither do we – growth happens in unexpected ways, in fits and starts.

Sometimes when we are going through a time of intense grief and struggle, trials and tribulations, God is using the same process that the protea requires. Perhaps there are a lot of old ideas and beliefs that hinder us and need to be burnt out.  Perhaps our ‘shell’ is so hard it takes the extreme heat of the trials to trigger growth for us.  Perhaps it is the timing – it is also unpredictable.  How often we want the predictable and understandable, our routines and comfort zones.  It may then take an extremely hot fire to move us to growth. We need to learn to let go of the predictable when we go through these life transitions and rather hold on with faith, that at the right time and conditions we will grow and flourish and maybe even bloom in the desert.

Fire in the Bible had a very special symbolism. God said, ‘When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not consume you.’ God stood with Shadrach, Mesheck and Abednego in the fiery furnace and they were not burned. So, Moses was given his commission at the burning bush; Isaiah was given his when the seraphim placed a burning coal on his lips and sent him on his mission. Fire is used to refine gold and silver to burn off the dross, it symbolizes holiness, intersession and worship and incense on the altar as our prayers ascend to God.

If we were to look at our current trials through the lens of God’s growth and refining process, it enables us to use the energy of the heat to spurt on new growth and momentum in moving forward.  We may not know what happens next, but if we allow the process to take place, will we indeed bloom like the beautiful King Protea and know that God is still working with us and preparing us for our mission in life.

 

Divorce, Grief, Seasons of Life, Transitions, Widowhood

Seeds Need the Wind

Deryn

Have you ever decided to go out for a walk on a glorious spring morning, only to find it turns into a dismal day with a howling gale ready to sweep you of your feet?

Spring is a time a when the weather is really unsettled, and it is hard to decide what to wear or what to do when you get up each day.  When you are going through a transition, you will find that you also can feel this way.  There is overwhelm, fear and maybe also sadness and depression making it hard to get out of bed in the mornings and focus on the day’s tasks. Especially as you work through grief and loss – you will get these days.

As an artist, I look to find answers in nature that are metaphors for what is going on in our lives.  The amazing thing is that the Bible also uses these metaphors so we can get answers and when I was meditating on the spring winds that brings in the season in Ecclesiastes, the wisdom was there! “He who watches the wind waiting for all conditions to be perfect will not sow seed and he who looks at the clouds will not reap a harvest.”  What the writer was saying was there are some things that you cant be sure of, you just have to take the chance and plant your seeds anyway.  We always want to be sure of our outcomes in the decisions we make, this is not always possible, we need to make decisions when the conditions are relatively good, but not perfect, and get moving with it because the perfect conditions will probably never be there. If you don’t make that decision to plant your seeds, being afraid of every cloud that could bring rain, you wont have a crop to harvest anyway!

Another lesson I found in nature was the wind was absolutely necessary for planting of seeds. How is this?  There are certain seeds that are only dispersed by the wind, when their seed capsule opens, the seeds with wings or parachutes need the wind to take them far from the parent plant to start a new colony further away, so there will not be too much competition for the same resources. As I walked along the side walk I saw thousands of winged seeds that had just fallen to the ground waiting for the wind to blow them into a place where they could take root and flourish.  How many of those seeds would survive?  I can imagine that not many of them would have made it to a new place where they could thrive.  Yes, there will be disappointments when your decisions don’t work out, you will make mistakes, there will be times of discouragement but trusting God to take just one of your seeds to a place where it will grow and thrive you will reap that harvest.

I have had to make many of these decisions as I have moved countries when I was both divorced and widowed, I had no idea how I was going to be provided for at the time, but the conditions were as good as they were going to get, I just had to make that call and pack my bags. There were mistakes I made, there were discouragements and times of extreme loneliness as I struggled through these decisions, but each struggle made me grow my root further and further into the soil of God’s love and provision for me and strengthened my faith.

If you are going through the winds of adversity at this time, and don’t know which way to go, I would love to hear from you and walk with you through this struggle. There is a seed of good in what you are going through that needs to be planted.

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Divorce, Grief, Transitions, Uncategorized, Widowhood

Align Yourself with Your Season in Life

Deryn

There is something special about Spring, it is the signal that a new season has begun.  When you are going through transitions in your life, it is a time when you see the first glimpse of your new life emerging. It could be the day you wake up and feel alive and happy for the first time after being widowed or divorced.  Or it could be that you no longer worry about the future but just know that all will be well.

It is very comforting to know that as long as the earth remains there will be seasons and if you align yourself with the seasons of your life and know which season you are in, it makes it much easier to navigate your life and transition. It would be difficult to bloom and flourish in the winter when you are meant to rest. Likewise, it would be hard to rest when the world around you is active in summer.  Accept the season you are now in, knowing it will pass.

After a long dark winter, the spring winds blow bringing rain to wet the earth and set in motion the cycle of new growth, seeds sprouting, trees budding, and flowers beginning to blossom.  Birds begin to sing and instead of the frozen fields, green pastures emerge ready to support the flocks.

You may not even have been aware of it, but while you were going through your period of grief and despair, new seeds were being planted in the recesses of your heart. Seeds of compassion, empathy, affinity, insight, sympathy and tenderheartedness. When eventually your Spring breaks through, you will experience that inner peace and joy and know you are through the worst of it, you will find that those seeds grow so that you will be able to empathize and help others when they are going through the winter in their life.

After I had healed from my divorce, I found that I could empathize with others who were going through the same experience and give them the comfort and encouragement they needed. After I had been through caregiving and the death of my late husband who had dementia, I was able to help and have compassion for families who were going through similar circumstances.

Napoleon Hill said, “look for the seed of good in something bad, nurture it until it grows into something good”, the Bible also says something similar, “All things work together for good to those who love God and are called according to His purpose.” That is the reason, I am here today, to help others who are going through difficult life transitions.  Let me help you plant the seeds of good in what you are going through today, so when your Spring comes, they will burst forth with joy!