The missions devotional this month was written by Dr. Lyle Mattson. Dr. Mattson is a member of the World Missions Committee.
-20, -30, -40, northwest winds, northeast winds, southwest winds, southeast winds, snow, more snow, and more more snow. We have had winter here in northwest Minnesota. When we were in Uganda in February, we attempted to convey what the conditions were back in Minnesota. (It was 70-90, green and sunny with intermittent rain in Jinja). After explaining our winter conditions, they would look at us incredulously with a total lack of understanding as to what we were attempting to communicate to them. The only question they could formulate in return was, “Why do you live there?” Over the years, I have, on occasion, pondered that very question. I could say, “It’s home,” but I was at home in Milbank, in Minneapolis, in Moorhead, and in Lake Park, and yet, every time I moved, I would leave a home behind to go to a new home. I could say, “I’m comfortable here,” yet there have been many days this winter when comfortable would not describe my conditions (especially those days when a hot bath was the only thing that encouraged my blood back into my fingertips!). I could say, “I have a job here.” In the present economic environment, that’s not a bad response, still, there have been opportunities to relocate over the years, yet we remain here. I could say, “I was called to serve here,” and while that would be Biblically correct and God has used me and my family to minister in this area, still, there has never been any dream or divine intervention in my life pointing me undeniably in this direction. So, the question remains: Why do we live here?
The closest thing that I have to an answer is simply this: I love 4 seasons! Call it what you will: romanticism or lunacy, but I love the change of seasons. I look out my window and everything right now is dead. It is early March, the temperature is hovering around the 0 mark and everything outside my window is dead. We took a walk today at noon and I didn’t see a single leaf or blade of grass—I saw some pine and spruce needles and occasional rabbit tracks. To live here in December, January, February, or March, you have to be prepared—you have to have food stores, because everything is dead. Then comes that day at the end of March or early in April, where the ground was dead and cold several days earlier, you see it—new blades of grass and new buds on trees—life where death had been. Within days, an impossible transformation takes place, the dull brown of the roadsides becomes vibrant green. The trees, grey and cold, become totally alive in themselves and alive with the birds and critters of summer. Creation has occurred all over again. Oh, I know there are scientific explanations for how this all occurs—I’ve seen them—but there is no logical explanation for why! Why a seed or root can sit in frozen ground and suddenly with the warmth of spring, burst into life. Every spring, we get to relive the words, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was formless and void…then God said…” I absolutely love seeing the transformation occur every year.
As Christians, we have the lavish enjoyment of the greatest of all springs. The explosion of life in the spring in northern Minnesota pales in comparison to the explosion of life in the heart of a newborn Christian. When coldness and death gives way to the budding of life eternal, we can’t really explain the how or the why—all we can explain is the who—Jesus! I love the 4 seasons, I really love the coming of spring, but more than this, I love the coming of Easter with its ever renewing message: “Do not be afraid; for I know that you are looking for Jesus who has been crucified. He is not here, for He has risen, just as He said…Go quickly and tell His disciples that He has risen from the dead.” Mt 28:5-7 NASB
So you who live with me in Minnesota, enjoy the spring—for the rest of you: eat your heart out. But wherever you may be, may the resurrection of Christ be as fresh as the new buds of spring.
