the spring season

Following his exploration of winter and it’s spiritual activities, Buchanan in his book Spiritual Rhythm turns to consider spring. He describes spring as life’s protestation of death, quoting Isaiah 35 which illustrates the blossoming of a wilderness into a gardenlike land. The return of life in the springtime is accompanied by restored hope and pulsating with joy, healing the pilgrim’s soul and restoring their vigor. Spring is marked by repentance and the breaking up of the hard ground of the pilgrim’s heart, frozen by winter’s chill. It’s in this season that devotion to God shifts from burden to delight. Springtime also enlarges the pilgrim’s capacity to see and notice things, to enjoy and care for things, and to love. In spring the pilgrim experiences vindication, they stop their shaking induced by winter’s cold and stand tall again.

The first spiritual activity of spring is that of waking up. Once the pilgrim has awoken, their spiritual activities include plowing, planting, and cleaning; activities that require strong resolve. Springtime is for strengthening the feeble hands and steadying the shaking knees. Buchanan likens plowing to listening, as the soil represents ears to hear; and similarly likens planting to receiving the Word of God (Scripture). Spiritual springtime cleaning involves examining life activities and relationships; distinguishing between the habitual and the purposeful, removing the life-sucking things while keeping life-giving ones. It also involves cleaning and airing out the spaces that have become cluttered and stifled by a long winter. Buchanan speaks of this season as scrubbing the heart of the pilgrim clear, as God comes in and scours it all spotless. Cynicism is broken and gives way to hope and restoration of the joy of salvation.  The cleaning out and rearranging of the pilgrim’s heart and soul are necessary in order for the pilgrim to operate out of strength and joy. The pilgrim must get to know himself in spring, know what makes him come alive, what makes his heart glad, and especially where he most often experiences God.