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“…if two lie down together, they keep warm, but how can one be warm alone?”
Ecclesiastes 4:11 (NASB)

When winter light floods the house, I struggle. Struggle more than on a sunny, summer day. Winter light reminds my soul that life on the outside as well as inside has become cold and dead.

On a summer day, it’s easier to be grateful for the little things: warm sunshine, green grass, flowers, and birds. But in the winter, it’s harder for me.

Winter with Mike was truly a time to enjoy hibernating together. Neither of us enjoyed cold, snow, and ice, but we did enjoy being together while we waited for spring to come again. The winter was bearable because the company was good. Really good.

I think in some profound way a piece of me died when he did. Sometimes I think it’s because my priorities were wrong – he held too much of me – I let my heart sink too deeply into his and lost sight of the True Anchor of my soul. I didn’t hate Mike in comparison to my love for God. I didn’t know how to do that, and I still don’t.

Other times, I think it’s simply the price of love. To love deeply is to risk devastating pain.

I struggle to find my way back to implicit and childlike trust in a God who rules the universe and yet allows us to experience psychic pain so deep it can’t be put into words. I know the world is broken. I know we suffer because of Adam’s sin. I know God suffers with us. I understand these things better now than I ever have.

But I also know now there are parts of Him that are utterly unknowable. I no longer simply know this with my mind – I have lived it in my heart and in my day-to-day life. And sometimes I can’t get around the cold, dead fear that the winter inside will never give way to spring.

But the verse on the refrigerator gently reminds me – even in the winter I can be this:

As sorrowful yet always rejoicing,
As poor yet making many rich,
As having nothing,
Yet possessing all things.
2 Corinthians 6:10 (NASB)

Father, thank You for remaining steadfast even when I don’t understand. I cannot comprehend who You are or why You allow us to suffer so deeply. But You have promised to help me rejoice even when it hurts, to show me how to use my pain to help others, and to have all I need in You, even when I feel as though I have nothing left. Help me to keep my focus on You and not the pain that weighs me down. Amen.