The Season of the Searing Summer
By Cara Croft
Some blog posts are to easy to write. There are lots of thoughts, the words come easily and flow like the cool fall breeze. Some posts blossom like spring flowers. Other posts are a little more difficult and feel frozen like the winter or scorching like the summer heat. This is a scorcher folks. The season of summer.
As we have been reading through the seasons of ministry and reflecting on how they mirror God’s created seasons of nature, I stop and reflect about what I experience in that season both physically and in ministry. When I reflect on summer all I think about is heat and high humidity. Some of you know exactly what I mean. Those mornings when you wake up, look outside, hope for the best, and open the door to what feels like an oven mixed with a wet blanket wrapped around your body. About the only thing I enjoy about the summer is sitting by a cool pool, sipping a cool drink. Anything to quench the thirst and cool the heat.
This is sometimes our life in ministry. Often coming out of the spring of ministry, when everything seems to be blossoming and full of life, we run into a hot, humid, and dry season. A time when things seem to be shriveling up instead of flourishing like they once were. These seasons may include heat in the form of conflict and difficult business meetings. The scorching winds of criticism and discontent. The fire of trial, the testing of marriage, the toll on the family. This can be a season of trying to till the hardened ground yet feeling like you are unable to break through and really make any progress. You may start to wonder, “what happened to that soft soil that was so easy to plant in” or “where are those beautiful flowers and budding trees of hope”. If you have been in this season you will be familiar with what I am trying to describe.
Picture the farmer. He goes out and toils all day in the heat and humidity. He continues to tend his crops, trying to water them as much as possible since the sky seems to have dried up. He focuses on trying to save the crop so that he can harvest it in the cooler days. (I am no farmer, nor do I live near farms so some of these details I am taking my own liberty with interpreting) We work really hard hoping that someday soon those fall winds will blow through, cool off the heat and bring some relief. Yet the heat toils on.
It is interesting to me that when we are in a season, especially a difficult one, it often feels like it is never going to end. We assume there will be no relief the suffering, and that the days of ease are long past and all that is left is this drought in which we find ourselves. The good news is a season is just that, a season. It is a temporary time and it will pass. Soon the cooler winds will blow. They will shake off what the summer scorched. The cold winter will bring its own trials but then the spring will blossom once more. Each season leading to the next. It is an oft repeated cycle. This is where our encouragement and our hope lay. God moves us through the seasons and uses them to grow and mature us. He uses them in our personal lives, he uses them in our churches, in our marriages, and in our families. Some seasons are easy to embrace while others seem to take all of energy to endure.
Hold on dear sister. Your summer will not last forever. There is a cool drink of the Spirit to bring enough relief to make it through each hot and weary day. While this season of summer may feel relentless, there are cooler and more fruitful days coming. Summer will yield a harvest if we are patient. In the meantime, cry out to God who promises us living water and green pastures in which we can rest.
Cara Croft is wife to Brian, mother to 4 adult/teenage children, and currently finishing her Master's degree in Christian Counseling. She enjoys counseling, reading, and growing in learning to care for the suffering. Cara is also the Director of Counseling Ministry at Practical Shepherding.