Summer: A Destination Season

This week marks the official start of summer.  In honor of this season, I will be sharing some reflections on its significance over the next few weeks.  I want to start with an observation: summer is a destination season.  Spring and fall are seasons of transition.  They are marked by change.  The start and end of spring and fall look very different.  But summer (along with winter) is a season that stays much the same.  We work hard all spring to plant our gardens and flowers and get the lawn ready for summer.  We clean our homes to remove the signs of winter dormancy.  But once summer comes, we enjoy the fruit of our labors.  There is still work to be done in the summer.  But it is the work of maintenance, rather than preparation.

Ever since the resurrection of Jesus, we have been in the springtime of history.  We are planting and sowing, cleaning and repairing.  We are getting ready for a destination we call the new creation.  In much the same way that spring creates an ongoing for summer, we live in anticipation of the final summer.  Our labor then will no longer be in preparation, but rather in celebration of this final, beautiful season of life.  We will have arrived.  The damage of sin will be cleaned up forever.  Jesus will be there.  God will be with us.