April seems to have come and gone. As I look at the calendar it’s hard to believe that yet another month of life has happened. In the same breath, though, I’m so thankful for that very life. For the joys that have come. For the moments and milestones we have celebrated. It feels like a huge blessing (and also something to be greatly celebrated) to be able to look up and see a month has passed. Instead of finding myself counting down the hours and minutes of each day, I am able to look back and wonder where the time has gone. What have I been occupied with that I’m no longer just surviving each day? For the most part, the answer to that question is nothing; normal, every day, ordinary things. From taking Audrey Nole to and from preschool, daily chores, and even celebration - a birthday and Easter filled this month and a wedding will round it out - what a gift to just move through life. Not completely without grief and sorrow, but with much less weight than in even the most recent past.
We have entered into a new season. One where our grief will be shared with those closest to us, but that will likely be a surprise to anyone not in our close circle. As two years came and went, and we move into year three without our son, a lot of life has happened. While we have been in the trenches of heartbreak and moving forward in this story of God’s, we are finally climbing out of the depths. It feels like Noah must have felt waiting for that dove to return with a sign of new life. That space after the storm but before the waters receded and the rainbow was unveiled. That is our new season. Hallelujah for the lifting of the storm clouds. Praise Jesus for getting us through. I don’t know if there’s a more appropriate time for a bottle of champagne to be popped than when Noah could look out those ark windows and see the sky - and all the animals were still alive. This April feels a bit like the popping cork of a champagne bottle , and I am so incredibly thankful.
So now, as we sit in this season, waiting for the waters to recede and before God places His bow in the sky, I want to remember to be thankful. To celebrate the many gifts we’ve been given and to honor the God who got us through the worst storm we’ve ever experienced. I’m sure that Noah was beyond excited when that dove came back with a branch. And I’m sure those days of waiting for dry ground felt long and tedious, but I can also imagine the celebration that must’ve been planning in his head whenever his feet could step off that gigantic boat.
“At the end of forty days Noah opened the window of the ark that he had made and sent forth a raven. It went to and fro until the waters were dried up from the earth. Then he sent forth a dove from him, to see if the waters had subsided from the face of the ground. But the dove found no place to set her foot, and she returned to him to the ark, for the waters were still on the face of the whole earth. So he put out his hand and took her and brought her into the ark with him. He waited another seven days, and again he sent forth the dove out of the ark. And the dove came back to him in the evening, and behold, in her mouth was a freshly plucked olive leaf. So Noah knew that the waters had subsided from the earth. Then he waited another seven days and sent forth the dove, and she did not return to him anymore.” - Genesis 8:6-12