Eternity in the Human Heart

Winter has always been my favorite season. I love the newness and quietness of snow and the beauty of each snowflake. I love all kinds of outdoor winter activities. My childhood memories are full of snowmen, snow forts, sledding, ice skating, ice fishing, and cross-country skiing. As an adult, despite not always living somewhere that gets substantial amounts of snow, I have made tons of memories in the snow with my own kids, living in Alaska, visiting my parents and my in-laws at Christmas and maple sugar season, sledding down a huge hill in our backyard in Nebraska, making due with dustings of snow in Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Kansas, and driving to the snowy mountains in Washington. Now that I live in Michigan, I have been looking forward to endless days of snowy adventures.

This year I was able to spend most of December at our house in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. My daughter, dog, and I arrived to over six inches of snow on the ground with more in the forecast each day. I spent a wonderful first few weeks cross-country skiing and snowshoeing, only complaining about the shoveling a little. But then once my husband arrived, the snow stopped falling and the forecast showed a weeklong warming trend on the horizon. I couldn't believe how disappointed I was. Hadn't the blissful days I already experienced been enough? Why this shockingly strong feeling for more and more?

I confessed my ingratitude and distrust in God's plan, but my discontentment continued. I confessed again, both to God and to several people who know me best, but I couldn't find any relief for my feelings and longings for more. More perfect weather. More cross-country skiing. More snow-filled adventures. I finally found relief after reading an Advent devotional by Dr. Greg E. Ganssle called "Seeking, Searching, and Finding", published by the Biola University Center for Christianity Culture and the Arts as part of The Advent Project 2024 (https://ccca.biola.edu/advent/2024/seeking-searching-finding. In his devotional, the author reminded me: "The cry for everything is our relentless desire. Our nearly hypnotic quest is not something to tame, to discipline, to repent. It is the seed of the image into which we were made. There is a taste of eternity in our hearts. It bubbles to the surface in this quest."

While I will still be confessing ingratitude and distrust the next time I feel these feelings, I will also be shifting my perspective and remembering that I was made for eternity. When I feel longing for more time with MaryJo and Oliver, I will try to remember that this longing points me to the eternity God has placed in my heart. When I see the same ingratitude and distrust I feel in other people's attitudes as well, I hope that I will give them some grace and see the eternity their hearts are hoping for and revealing too. "He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end." Ecc. 3:11.

Oliver enjoying a dusting of snow in Kansas

Cross-country skiing with Oliver in Alaska

Of course, the funny thing is, the snow melted, but it didn't stop us from having fun or making special memories with the people we love the most this Christmas season. In fact, we had a white Christmas and even got to sled and make snowmen with my young nephews the day after Christmas in the rapidly melting snow and have an epic snowball fight with my other nieces and nephews a few days later in the lingering remains of snow after the warm weather. God always gives us what we need, and so much more besides with so much more awaiting us in eternity. Our hearts know. 

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 6:23

I don't think I have ever walked on a Lake Superior beach in winter before

A snowman and a snowball fight in our future garden

Beauty everywhere, even in the melted snow turned to ice