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We long to enjoy eternal springtime, that day when nothing and no one will spoil our joy. Life in this world encompasses the experiences of joy, and sorrow, and pleasure, and pain—these are the seasons of the soul. The Bible tells us, “To everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven.” (Ecclesiastes 3:1)

At times, we experience joy that fills our hearts to the brim. At other times, pain fills our hearts to the brim.

But what do we do when a day begins in sunshine and ends in frost? How do we face four seasons in one day, when joy is followed by sorrow, followed by joy, followed again by sorrow?

Not long ago, our friends and fellow workers in ministry, the Jonker family, welcomed the birth of baby Paisley—joy! But just a few short hours later, they were faced with saying tearful farewells to Paisley’s great-grandfather, Jim—sorrow.

How can one move from the joy of springtime to the grief of winter and back again and again? How do both of these emotions share the same space in our fragile hearts?

This is the difficult dance of emotions that was so gracefully played out in the life of the apostle Paul. Here is his eloquent summation of how he did it:

“By purity, by knowledge, by patience, by kindness, by the Holy Spirit, by sincere love, by the word of truth, by the power of God; with the weapons of righteousness both for the right hand and for the left . . . As dying and yet—look!—we continue to live . . . as sorrowing, yet always rejoicing” (2 Corinthians 6:6–7, 9–10).

As I sat at my kitchen counter and prayed that God does for the Jonker family what only He can do, I reminded myself that life for believers—perplexed as we may find it at times—isn’t random. It is measured and ordered by the infinite wisdom of God.

And so, humbly, we bow in worship.