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Except a kernel of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.

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March 13, 2017

Waiting with the Robins

 

March did not start with a roar this year; it came in more like a wet dog than a lion. I was born in March, so I’ve always been a defender of the month that most New Englanders despise. It is, after all, a gloomy, raw, merciless month. Wind, rain, sometimes snow and frost, pummel the soggy earth while we anxiously flip over another day, panting towards the elusive Spring, the vernal equinox when daylight squares with the darkness.

“What spring?” the Cape Codder snarls. And indeed, as I write this, snow covers the ground.

The first time I ever laid eyes on Cape Cod, it was March. I admit, driving along Route 6 in the late 70’s, there was little to draw you in. Gray was all I remember seeing or thinking. Gray sky, houses, trees, ocean. Rain, then snow, then rain again. Or maybe it was sleet. It was the first time I heard the term “sea frost”. I thought that was beautiful – sea frost – enough to make a drunken poet pack up her VW bus and peacock feathers and head towards the sea. You had to be courageous and crazy both to live here in the winter back then. But spring was coming – wasn’t it?

I landed in April, early April, not understanding that the cold Atlantic kept Cape Cod at least ten degrees colder than the inland in the spring, like a wet blanket slapping against the stubby pines, the wind slipping through your walls and your skin like brain freeze.

We all drank a lot. But you got so you noticed the little things; the way the wind smelled when it shifted and came up from the south, the pungency of the melting marsh, the salt air slightly sweeter. Then the peeper frogs, at first just s few then a full choir as the days stretched out and the sun lingered over the bay at sunset. Ospreys circled. And the smell of wood smoke at night and oyster shells thawing out in the sun – these things you noticed because you had something like hope or you would die. Some people did. A painter that lived downstairs from me hung himself. Another neighbor got drunk playing cards on a boat and fell overboard during a brawl. His body was found washed up on the beach in the morning. It was a shame but not a surprise.

I read recently that the height of the suicide season is March, not the holidays like most people think. It made sense to me. Hope deferred makes the heart sick, it says in Proverbs. Like terminally ill.

My parents named me Robin because a robin, at least up north, is the first sign of spring. But not really. The truth is they might head south if they run out of food, but most robins tough it out, staying out of sight, staying warm and mostly quiet. Just like people. It’s funny to watch the hysteria when the temperature bumps sixty degrees. Tee shirts are yanked from plastic bags in the closet, Christmas Tree shop is gridlocked with shopping carts stuffed with clay pots, seed starter kits and spades. And the robins start to swarm the lawns and low branches of trees. They also start to sing.

I guess it’s this bipolar side of March that draws me. Life defying death – or maybe just showing up like it said it would, like it does every year, but we are just getting used to the dark, to staying quiet like the robins and sleeping a lot.

Yesterday at work I heard a cry, then a wail and turned to see an elderly woman collapsing into another woman’s arms. Her husband was dying. It was likely not the first cry of loss she would bear. That kind of cry is soulish, a tearing of the heart; it bleeds and doesn’t stop for a long time. I took a deep breath and turned back to my work, then heard the faint melody of “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” coming in through the overhead speakers, the same speakers that call for codes, or security, or stat-someone or something all day long. I looked up and smiled, then heard a few Awwww’s and soft laughter from coworkers nearby. A baby had just been born. Just a few walls past the dying husband, life let out its first holler. “I’m here! And it’s so stinking bright!!!”

Ebb and flow. It’s not always as neat and predictable as we’d like. My daffodils, probably 100 of them, have pushed about 6 inches through the ground. Now they are covered in snow, the frozen earth squeezing the frail life out of them. But they’re tough, like robins. They know March. And they know spring will come.

And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance;  and perseverance, character; and character, hope.  Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us. Romans 5:3-5 NKJV

I guess that’s one thing that drew me to Jesus. Real Christians are gutsy. They know that real life comes through dying first. They know love never fails and sometimes they are gutsy enough to walk on water, crazy enough to try.

Hope never disappoints even when it makes us wait and wait. The Maker of all things can bring life with just one breath, and with one word flood the darkness with light. March has nothing on Him. One day the snow will melt, the daffodils will shake off the frost and the robins will sing. And the crazy old poet who was born in March will sing along, will sing praise to the One who brings new life.

Filed Under: Faith, Hope Tagged: Cape Codder, robin, spring
4 Comments

March 10, 2013

The Cross or What’s So Good About Good Friday?

Cross in Ghana

Cross in Ghana

March is beautiful somewhere. But not here. I’ve always been a big defender of the month nobody loves because I was born right near the end of it. Hence the name, Robin, as in “first sign of spring”, although with global warming the robins have become confused and disoriented, showing up in January with beach chairs. Also, on my 36th birthday I received my best birthday present ever, my little Jake the Giant, born eight minutes after midnight. So we rally during March in my family. It’s a month of great promise if you choose to look at it that way.

They say March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb. I’m looking out my window right now and it’s downright dismal. It’s like it can’t decide whether to act like winter or spring so it’s “sprinter”; a soggy, slushy mess thrown in your face at 40 MPH. There are daffodils out there, behind the fence, under the slush, shivering their little frail stems off. It’s a brutal month, coming in more like a rabid dog this year than a lion.

Yet it could be 60 tomorrow, evaporating memories of today, and we would all be at Home Depot buying seed starter kits and lawn fertilizer. We are wired to hope. Teens will be crowding around basketball hoops with their shirts off and a few motorcycles will blast down the street. The daffodils will shake it off and push upward.

This March is a hideous commercial event with Easter and Saint Patrick’s Day sharing the shelves, only two weeks apart. Leprechauns leaning on bunnies and shamrocks in the jelly beans. Not just the robins are confused! I wonder if Jesus and Patrick find it amusing or terribly sad. Religious folks prepare by putting dirt on their foreheads and giving up Dunkin Donuts for a month. Parents are required to fork out gifts for their kids, along with the overstuffed Easter basket because the kid next door got a Wii last year for Easter. Corned beef and ham dinners raise the American blood pressure even higher.

My mom used to boast that I was born on Maundy Thursday, which I thought for years was “Monday-Thursday”, like it took four days. As I grew, I realized I was born on the day celebrating the Last Supper, which preceded Good Friday, the day they crucified Jesus. I didn’t understand why either of these days were celebrated or called Good. My mom baked hot cross buns as if that explained everything.

The cross was confrontational to me even then. It seemed like everyone wanted to sing about Christ being risen but we kind of skipped over the cross. I knew that Jesus died there, a long agonizing, brutal death. He knew all about it when they ate together the night before. Betrayal, greed, denial. He carried his own cross the next day to his own death, “enduring the shame for the joy set before him.”

The older I get, the more terrifying and beautiful the cross becomes. And consequently, the more triumphant and glorious Easter Sunday is. The power of His resurrection should fuel every moment of every Christian’s life. Jesus IS risen, the stone is rolled away, defeating death, tearing the veil that separated us from perfect love, freedom, and life eternal. It is the most astounding act recorded on earth, too marvelous for words.

Yet the cross still haunts me because it is where humanity collided with God and it is messy and mysterious and unfathomable in suffering. The same shame that Jesus bore for me, where He was broken and his blood poured out for me has become my escape to joy unspeakable. I shake my head in disbelief, staggered by this love.

I like that Easter is in March this year, and I like that my birthday (and yours, Jake) falls on Good Friday. I can celebrate my entry into this world fifty seven years ago, my parents filled with wistful dreams and fragile love for their first little girl. Thirty years later, God led a broken, dirty woman to the foot of Calvary’s cross. There I was born again.

We can only keep on going, after all, by the power of God, who first saved us and then called us to this holy work. We had nothing to do with it. It was all his idea, a gift prepared for us in Jesus long before we knew anything about it. But we know it now. Since the appearance of our Savior, nothing could be plainer: death defeated, life vindicated in a steady blaze of light, all through the work of Jesus.  (2 Timothy 1:9 the Message)

March will usher in April. Strange how God determines that the death of things would bring new life. Creation is proving it right outside my window. My son, Spence had clipped these words from a page to “Calvary Road” by Roy Hession and tacked them to his dresser, right beside his pillow.

When we put pride to death, God imparts power and implants hope. We rise renewed. But when we revert to our self-sufficient ways, the Spirit presses in. And so we must return to the cross, mortifying the martyr in us, destroying the self-display. As we hold fast to the cross, God offers the spirit of humility. Stray from the cross and humility recedes, pride returns. It is simple; it’s the cross. Again I say the cross. I didn’t say it was easy, just simple.

There are days that I’m uncertain of why I am here, darkness descends into a private pain that is shared only with God and my heart is restless. It is then that I turn to the cross, and my darkness is swallowed up in its shadow. Jesus no longer hangs there, there are no crowds; it is silent. But I am reminded of what love truly means. In the midst of his exquisite pain, forgiveness was granted and even his mom was taken care of. I don’t have to stay there, but I can return there and remember who I am without it, that His grace still flows from it, and covers me. This is the Jesus I can never understand or explain. This is the Jesus I will follow all of my days…until death brings again, new life.

 

 

Filed Under: Hope, Love, Redemption Tagged: cross, Easter, robin, spring
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