Wintry Reflection with Josh Dunahoo (Job 36-37)

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Transcript

Well, friends—we find ourselves at home during a winter storm. I hope you all are warm and bundled up—and, of course, if anyone of you finds themselves in a dire situation, please reach out to us so we can see what help we might offer.

Winter storms are an excellent means of reflection for us. The snow hits, the cold comes, and there's just not much we can do about it. We have to go inside, get warm, and wait. There is a gift for the spiritual life in a winter storm. Eugene Peterson called winter snow the "robe for sleeping nature." He notes how in winter, we look out at dead things—grass yellowing, trees laid bare—but we know the spring will come. That grass will sprout up green again, the trees will grow green and come into bloom. Winter is not an end, but a necessary interim. The roots of the trees continue to grow deeper; the life returns another year richer…wiser. Everything looked dead and gone for a while, but life persisted under the surface.

When I first read Peterson's reflection years ago, I thought, that's beautiful—a good reminder that there is always hope when things look dark. The Song of Songs says it too: "For behold, the winter is past; the rain is over and gone. The flowers appear on the earth…"

Winter snow is a time where we are not so much invited, but told to stop. A time where going inward, digging deep, waiting are not optional. We can fight back and freeze—which ultimately endangers us—or we can wait it out.

There's a passage in the book of Job where a young man named Elihu says God controls the weather—that winter must be an instrument of God's hand. Job is poetry, and some have interpreted Elihu to mean that God sends winter snow to stop us in our work, that we might consider God's work instead. A winter shut down is commanding. We have to stop and consider—contemplate our lives, contemplate God. Depending on whether we want God in our lives, we might see the weather as judgment or love.

Years ago, I made my first honest attempt to leave my career ambition in the music industry for a new direction in ministry. I applied the work ethic I learned in music to ministry. In the music industry, you tend to say yes to every gig—every tour—working a ton of hours and learning a bunch of music, because there are months where it all shuts down and you need to make sure you've packed away enough nuts for winter! So, in my ministry job, I worked those long hours—assuming this is what a good work ethic looks like. Fourteen months later, I had worked way too much and accomplished too little—and I was burned out. I felt like a failure. I volunteered to be a budget cut and left—moved back to Nashville.

On the drive back to Nashville, I was avoiding winter storms and took the southern route via Interstate 10. I was listening to Richard Rohr's books. The first was "Falling Upward"—a brilliant book about the second half of life. Basically, Rohr says the trials and failures of our younger years can teach us that failure doesn't take us further from God, but actually serves to move us closer. How often do we turn to God when we're crushing it? No, it's always in failure. So, in that way, failure is a gift because it guides us home. The cold hard truth of our failure forces us to go inward, to stop what we're doing, and find our way home.

Next, I listened to his biography on St. Francis. In his younger years, Francis had a penchant for vanity and very little stomach for poverty and suffering. He would retch when he saw lepers by the city gate. He had a vision of being a great knight—going off to war to attain riches and vainglory for himself. But he wasn't much of a fighter. He was wounded almost immediately and returned in shame. His shame led him to a dilapidated old stone-walled church where he prayed to God, and he heard Jesus ask him to "rebuild his church." He took the command literally—which is pretty common early on in any faith development—and started asking neighbors for stones to rebuild the walls of the church. He discovered that the simplicity of working in community, finding beauty in nature, and doing for others was better than all his earlier pursuits as a famous knight. Later in life, he was known for kissing the hands of lepers and blessing them.

I was stopped in my tracks like a winter snow. I got out of the car and stood in utter blackness in Alamogordo, New Mexico—not a sound anywhere. A few stars overhead. And I prayed to know Jesus like Francis. I spent the next few months of winter on the back porch in Nashville, learning contemplative prayer and trying to understand how my failures might be leading me to God. Ultimately, Elihu and Rohr have a similar thing to say to us—the things that stop us in our tracks, whether winter or failure, can be judgment or love. We can respond by going inward, reflecting, and turning to God—and know the great love Jesus has offered us. Or, we can stay out in the cold, suffer the pains of winter, and understand judgment.

Winter storms never come at a convenient time. I was really excited about tomorrow and looking at Matthew 4 through 5:1 with you all. Every time the snow stops everything, I'm faced with a decision: How am I going to face this wintery shut down? Today, I choose to use it as a moment for reflection—to consider where I need to press my roots down deeper. To find warmth and rest in God.