Spring is Coming
May 24, 2025 — Laura House
I don’t know how spring has transpired where you live, but in Virginia, it’s been enormously unpredictable. With great anticipation, I readied my porch in April to receive the pots of delicate flowers that I enjoy so much, only to wake up to chilly temperatures over and over. Ranging from 87 degrees to 52 degrees as the daily highs, the month of April was an interesting guessing game of what the next day would bring. Eventually May came, the community pool next door opened, and I went to work planting an assortment of unusual flowers on my tiny patio. Unexpectedly, the warmth turned to cold again, and I dragged them all inside each evening so the chilly nights wouldn’t cause their demise.
Finally enjoying temperatures in the lower 80’s last week, there was plenty of sunshine and use of the air conditioner. Spring was here to stay! Or so I thought. As I write today, it’s back in the 60’s again with a low tonight in the 40’s. I’m not in the mood to undo my full porch of plants again, so I’m hoping they make it!
Virginia’s spring this year reminds me of the fluctuating emotions of grief, especially in the first year or two. One day (or moment) you believe that you have made remarkable progress and you’re going to actually make it through, and then the next, you feel like you are back where you started, with Spring nowhere in sight. Grief is a roller coaster.
Hoping to encourage me when my loss was new, a fellow bereaved mom, much farther down the road than I was, told me that my grief would change — that the level of pain would not always be so intense. I don’t think I believed her then, but she was right. If you are early in your grief journey, you can rest assured that the back and forth occurrence is normal and it really will eventually change.
After the loss of his daughter, Steven Curtis Chapman produced two albums that perfectly embody the thoughts and feelings of a bereaved parent. During the first year, I found that the lyrics expressed many of the emotions I was experiencing but couldn’t articulate. The opening verse of one song, Spring is Coming, says this:
“We planted the seed while the tears of our grief soaked the ground; The sky lost its sun, and the world lost its green to lifeless brown. Now the chilling wind has turned the earth hard as stone; And silently seed rise beneath ice and snow; And my heart's heavy now; But I'm not letting go of this hope I have that tells me; Spring is coming, Spring is coming, And all we've been hoping and longing for soon will appear; Spring is coming, Spring is coming; It won't be long now, it's just about here.”
Looking back at the past nine years, I’ve discovered that even this far down the road, there are still moments of grief, but fewer and further in-between. There always will be, until I too am with Jesus and reunited with Nathan. But my vantage point has drastically changed. When those hard times come, I now have a history — I can look back and see how the Lord has held me through every single painful moment.
If you don’t yet have a history to reflect on God’s provision, rely on the testimony of others around you, and of the powerful promises in His Word. As you trust Him, you’ll eventually see that He was holding you all along — caring for you, grieving with you, and strengthening you.
Spring is coming.
“Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff,
they comfort me.” — Psalm 23:4
“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid." — John 14:27
“I waited patiently for the Lord; he turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand. He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God. Many will see and fear the Lord and put their trust in him.” — Psalm 40:1-3
