Seasons

I’ve been quiet in this space lately. The Lord has been teaching me a necessary lesson in this season of rest: Creative work is often hard and fearsome, and just like a fruit tree, authentic creativity cannot be perpetual.

I know this to be true in both my photography and writing. There are seasons where all I can see is beautiful light, and there’s a burning desire within me to grab my camera and become absorbed in capturing God’s creation. There are times when everything I see, read, or hear inspires words from my pen, the well is full and words pour forth with ease.

There are the seasons when, though the images are created and the words are written, the creativity comes with much greater effort. In these times, the results are still authentic and the Lord blesses me as I write the words, and hopefully you as you read them.

Then, there are times of dormancy. Here nothing flows. No eyes to see the beauty nor a desire to capture it well. No words flowing to edify. The wellspring seems encased in a winter’s freeze and remains immovable.

It is in this winter season that I struggle with frustration and discouragement, insecurity and unbelief. I have tried to force it, but it’s never real. I compare myself to other writers and photographers who seem to produce endless creativity and I bemoan my insufficiencies. Like the Canadian winter, this season is barren, and seems longer than it likely is. It makes me want to hibernate under a blanket until its bitter winds cease blowing over a frozen wilderness.

I’ve found myself in this dormant place lately. This time I’ve fought it less, surrendering (a little more) to the season as God’s good design and purpose. The result has been fewer pictures created and not many words penned.

Today I felt a warm spell, suggesting the season is changing. Today I took a picture of the most beautiful flower I know, and I penned these honest words. I was also reminded of a day, just a year ago, when I sat on a blue picnic table and felt the weight of another winter’s dormancy.

I remember telling the Lord that day that I felt like the scene looked. A heavy fog settled on the seaside community where I was visiting. The distant water of low tide was hazy gray and the sky invisible. It was mid-morning on a supposed sunny day, but it looked like dusk on a cloudy day.

The low lying fog silenced the busy rushing world as I sat in solitude on the shore. I came to write, but the page remained blank. I prayed instead. I remember praying for clarity, peace and joy to use this quiet gift the Lord has given me. I talked to the Lord a long while that morning there on the blue picnic table in a world shrouded in gray.

Before I was finished, the heaviness within me had lifted. I picked up my pen and began to write. Words filled the empty page. After a few minutes, I looked up to notice the fog had lifted, revealing a perfect blue sky decorated with wisps of dancing clouds.

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“For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:
a time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
a time to kill, and a time to heal;
a time to break down, and a time to build up;
a time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
a time to seek, and a time to lose;
a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
a time to tear, and a time to sew;
a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
a time to love, and a time to hate;
a time for war, and a time for peace.” Ecc. 3:1-8