Snow Thoughts

January always provokes deep thoughts for me. Perhaps it’s the slow-down after the holidays. Or maybe it’s the always-inside-looking-out-the-window-wondering-when-it’ll-warm-up-enough-to-venture-back-outside-again. Whatever the reason, the truth remains: there is something about the frozen ground and the snow-covered-everything that inspires a sort of awe inside of me. Strangely, I’ve never noticed it before.

I was thinking this morning about this snow-covered, frozen kind of beauty. And it occurred to me that winter is so much about hope. And renewal. It’s about preparing for re-made earth and all the fresh in-the-raw that approaches underneath all of that frozen.

I was also reminded of the picture of God’s snow-blanketing grace and the beauty that it is.

I thought of dark red crimson and how many snowflakes it would take to cover it completely and make it only snow white.  How extreme that cleansing would have to be. How extreme that cleansing is — the kind He gave me. It’s the clean that God sees when He looks at my heart through the lens of the Jesus-blood He used to clean me. White as snow. 

And I decided that God must have a pretty good sense of humor. Because I have never liked the cold of winter and the forever-long month of February with the salt-dirty cars driven by winter-weary people. But somehow, in all of these winterly thoughts, I am realizing that I have somehow come to love it.

I wonder if that makes God laugh.