Your Light in Darkness

I don’t like cold weather! And it is winter in Australia where I live now. This always come to a surprise to other people. They thought I should have gotten used to cold weather by now, but the fact is that even though I was born and lived in Europe for the first thirty years of my life, I still don’t like cold weather. I guessed I’ve had enough of cold weather in my life.

The long hard winter is not unusual in Europe. Short day, long cold, gloomy evening, bare trees and bone chilling cold wind are only a short version description of winter in Poland. To my surprise, some people in Australia often would express their fascination for living in the country with the snow. The reality of “White Christmas” in many of European countries including Poland is in fact quite different from how it is depicted on the movies. When Christmas celebration ended, we would still leave with heavy snow every day, and quite often it makes more challenging to daily life than makes us happy. Getting around in melting snow makes your shoes wet and leaves you feeling cold.

Winter in Australia isn’t a bone chilling winter, though it does not make me less forgiving to a cold weather, it gives me a new positive look to cold weather. Because Australia located in Southern Hemisphere, where long summer heat can be scorching hot in some parts of the continent, cold weather can be a welcome break for me. Enough talking about long cold gloomy dark days what I dislike, what truly amazes me about Australia is that there are always some full dense canopy trees, bushes and even weeds that are flowering and blooming all year round. There is always something that symbolize life and living. It is as if nature is trying to encourage and remind me to think and see that there is always light on the other side of darkness.

I see the change of weather as a perfect example of our spiritual life. There are times when we can not see much of a presence of God in our life. When things seem unclear or simply too dark to see. There are times when we cannot see life blooming around us, and we simply take one day at a time without any special enthusiasm or joy. For those winter times of our life, God gives us a lesson in nature: there is always a source of life; some trees or flower plants would need to go through dark cycle before showing their full beauty again. But there is value in every waiting and in the meantime believing that even in cold days we can find some ways of staying warm.

In the moments not only of winter, but simply events of darkness of our life, be reassured that there is light and life.

Tonight, make yourself a hot cuppa, sit next to the fireplace (or heater) and enjoy the music. You might not realise when the time of relax will change into prayer and presence of God – the Light and Life.

Wishing you a warm beautiful week.

Sr Grace