Nothing Gold Can Stay: The Joy After Sorrow

Sometimes life hits you, without warning, like a blizzard in March.

 There is grass. There is mild, winter weather, and the birds singing of spring. 

 And then there is cold, below zero temperatures, snow piling faster than you can shovel, and winds blowing snow and making it impossible to see in any direction around you.

 Sometimes, life is like that. 

 Sometimes things come so suddenly, so fiercely, so strongly, that you wonder how they could possibly stay. Like beautiful, spring weather during a New England March. 

 So I pray every morning and every night, "God, thank you for this gift you have given me today. And if I must, I pray You will give me the strength to let go and give it back to You."

 How did I know to pray that? Was it the speed in which "the gift" was given, the fear of it being taken away, or the Holy Spirit gently preparing me?

 Reader, He took the gift away as quickly as He gave it to me. 

 As my favorite poet says, "Nothing gold can stay."

 But there is something they don't tell you about blizzards- when the sun comes out again, it reflects off of all the fresh snow, and the sun, if possible, is even more glorious. 

 Nothing Gold Can Stay

by Robert Frost

Nature's first green is gold,

Her hardest hue to hold.

Her early leafs' a flower,

But only so an hour.

Then leaf subsides to leaf.

So Eden sank to grief,

So dawn goes down to day.

Nothing gold can stay. 

 They tell you life is hard, but you always hope you will be the exception, that you will miss the blizzard. 

 I didn't know the strange joy that comes after sorrow, the brighter sun after a blizzard that only Jesus can bring. 

Nothing gold can stay. 

At least nothing except Jesus' promises.