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“April Showers Bring May Flowers”
Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through Him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.
– Romans 5:1-5
The concept of “showers and flowers” may be one way to look at the seasons of Lent and Easter, and our earthly life and our resurrected life in Christ. First, we went through the season of Lent, with its emphasis on rooting out our sin and our own soul-searching. Then, just as May flowers follow April showers (and snow!), Easter breaks into our lives! We start seeing how all those Lenten messages of Jesus’ sufferings prepared us for the awesome wonder of Christ’s resurrection – and how the Lord is preparing us for our own resurrection.
We are continually reminded to look at the “showers” of trials and suffering in anticipation of the “flowers” that will bloom in our lives because of them. In Romans 5 the Apostle Paul identifies these growing flowers as endurance, character and hope.
God gives us this insight into His loving heart so that we may know of His victory over sin, Satan and the grave… so that we may know of the power of His love for us… and so that we may know His will for our lives – both now and into eternity. So bloom a bit with Him today!
Pastor Nickel
