It’s March 23rd, it’s mid-afternoon and -14 with the windchill. Nova Scotia has been bombarded with snow over the past week and now below seasonal temperatures are making snow removal impossible without heavy equipment. Check out this photo series on Buzzfeed.

Two weeks ago there was a beautiful snow storm on my day off. It was picture perfect snow, large flakes gently falling, the temperature just below 0, in short a  perfect winter day. Even if winter is not my favourite season. I decided to take my camera into the back yard to see what I could see. I am constantly surprised as how much I ‘see’ now that photography is a hobby.

The three foot depth of snow was firm enough to walk on. I followed the tracks of some small rodent from one side to another, I discovered barely swollen buds on some trees, a single berry was a bright spot in the monochromatic landscape. But the discovery I was most enchanted with was when I crawled underneath the evergreen trees to find moss on the trunks. Soft, green moss. As soft as the softest grass in spring. It made me irrationally happy! The idea of something green and growing in the midst of the worst winter in over a decade brought joy to my heart. I am not sure how long I sat there, under the cover of the trees, alternately photographing it and touching it.

As always, my mind turned to ministry and questions arose: What green and growing life is hidden under a crust of cold? Why don’t we look for that instead of staring at the frozen crust. What makes us have so little trust that green and growing happens in its season? Do we respond with joy to new life or are we so focused on how cold we are that we don’t even see it?

The title of this post is taken from a line in a beautiful song entitled Hymn of Promise by Natalie Sleeth. You can find complete lyrics here. The full line is ‘In the cold and snow of winter, there’s a spring that waits to be. Unrevealed until its season, something God alone can see.”

And that’s my frozen window on God’s world.