Broken Branches

 

I started my day in the prayer window. Now that schools are back, it’s quiet in the living room at that time of day. I hadn’t slipped in there, contemplatively, for awhile, so it was with curiosity that I looked out at the familiar scene beyond the glass.

My attention was caught by the dead stump left dangling after a delivery lorry tore a branch off, months ago. It swayed slightly in the breeze, held on to the mutilated branch by a finger or two of bark.

As we begin to emerge through the mists of the battlefield of covid-19, many of us – maybe all – are maimed by loss. We have lost time with precious grandchildren, moments of their young lives which can never be recovered. We have lost time with our precious elderly mothers and dads and aunts and uncles, moments of sunset beauty which are fleeting, fading away before the long night. We have lost loved ones to the virus or other ailments, and have lost the precious moments to share our grief with others who loved them, watching on YouTube from afar. We have lost momentum and direction, lost jobs, lost travel plans, lost celebrations, lost our own health.  Children have lost social skills, education; students have lost the heady freedoms of university life.

It has been a season of profound loss. (It has also been a season of unexpected, hidden blessing. But that’ll be a subject for another blog.)

That branch was torn off by a delivery truck, but the tree still stands. Soon, new leaves of spring will sprout and grow. What was asleep will awaken again and there will be beauty. It’s time for the fingers of bark to release their hold of the broken stump, and to focus on new life. It’s time for hope to rise, for joy to return.

Whatever was torn away from us, whatever we have lost, it’s time to cut away the scar tissue that keeps the pain dangling in the winds of life. It’s time to drop the ache and despair. New life is coming. The vaccines are working. The promise of spring is just around the corner.

Together, we emerge from the very real battlefield on which we have all been for a year. Together we encourage each other as we recover our joy, as hope inspires smiles and tentative expectations are birthed.

Together we lean into Jesus. Some of us will look back at these days like the writer of the famous Footprints poem, and we’ll see just the one set of footprints. When we couldn’t take another step, Jesus has carried us.