Up early this morning, it is a Saturday, I do not work and the dark of night is still outside my window. Yesterday, the first Fall rains came. For weeks on end we've had sunny, warm days-a prolonged summer that hung like rare jewels upon the horizon, ready to be plucked and enjoyed.
I did enjoy those days, basking in the sun like a peaceful cat on a window sill. My daily walks I drank in the views of hills and valleys rich with trees and forests and glimpses of fields resting before their winter's sleep. My friend and I spent hours discussing end times, God's will and politics while pushing ourselves up hills being winded by the efforts. 
We stopped at apple trees, grape vines, plum trees, and blackberry bushes. It was truly amazing how many trees there were, yellow apples, green apples, red apples. As the weather turned, the colder nights turned the sugar in the apples sweeter and we munched and talked out way through the wooded trails. 
Yesterday, starting out the rains began and the trails became yellow and orange bathed in the falling leaves. The sound of the rain on the forests canopy was a present reminder that this season was over and a change was happening. Like most changes, this was a wistful sad one for me, a goodbye to golden days of drinking in the forest's smells and pushing myself to gain strength and endurance. By the time the first loop of our walk ended, we were both pretty soaked and my friend suggested we not do the second loop up another hill through the paved city streets. I agreed and we parted ways each to our own pursuits.
Now, early morning the awareness of the fleeting nature of life is upon me. I feel as if I could poke through the fabric of my life to the other side of eternity so easily. I'm finding it difficult to attend to mundane daily tasks as this apparition of "life" comes and goes. Increasingly I am less inclined to get involved in work political struggles and tend to watch more and say less. It is not my job any more to fight some battles. 
Staying on task with realizing that the lives I touch may at any time be snuffed out by a relapse, I share as much as I ethically can about the importance on using the time in treatment to seek God, pray and try to reconnect to a Higher Power they've pushed aside for crime and use.
Each morning, I seek God's face and try to renew my commitment to being in His will and love. It's somewhat discouraging to find, that in the same way the makeup I put on each morning wears off through the day, so does my Godliness.
It is part of being human, this inability to ever perfectly reflect God's nature in ourselves. My devotional this morning was about Moses. It spoke about the fact, early in his life, he felt the need to defend his people. He fought and killed someone who was hurting an Israelite. Then he fled, to live 40 years in the desert tending flocks. When he came across the burning bush and God called him to go and rescue His people he asked, "Who am I that I should go?" He had the passion early on but lost it through the mundane of the every day existence.
So it is for most of us. The "everydayness" of life tends to dull our higher callings, our passions, our dreams. The conflicts, the challenges of life tends to sap our energies until we start running on empty, so to speak. Right now, frankly, I'm running on empty. I've lost my edge because of sorrow, disappointments, and stress. What will I do about this? Well, when I was younger I would run. I would change careers, friends, living circumstances and seek relief from the pain of going through the trial. That didn't work of course, but in my youth I thought change was the answer.
Now, with the awareness ever in my mind that, "this too will pass," I move more slowly. Yes I will attempt to do more to rest my soul, replete my inner reserves, and re-charge my batteries, but I will not run. Moses ran to 40 years of wilderness experience to train his soul, I don't have 40 years left to train my soul. But what I have is precious to me. So the rains came finally and our seasons have changed. In my own life the rains have come, and the season has changed.
With God's help, I will stand steady, continue to seek His face and will and accept the fact this life holds suffering in its hands for many. It is a bitter cup but it is part and parcel of being alive in an imperfect world. My hope remains that someday, I will wake up and find "joy in the morning" whether it is in this life or the next and at that time all tears will be wiped away.
Today if you are going through your own valley of weeping, look up. God hears and answers prayers and as you seek Him, peace will come in the midst of the storm and you will be strengthened to keep going on until the suffering is over. He promises it in his Word, and God does not lie.
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