One of my absolute favorite chapters in the whole Bible is
Romans 8. If I was to be stranded
on a desert Island and had to choose one chapter to take with me, it would be
Romans 8. Romans 8 has so many
wonderful words on grace, creation, new creation, hope and of
course—Jesus! One of my favorite
sections of Romans 8 comes in verse 22-23
22 We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the
pains of childbirth right up to the present time. 23 Not only so, but we ourselves,
who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for
our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies.
Something about these words of creation groaning and we
ourselves groaning in the pains of childbirth seems to speak to me with a much greater
punch in the dog days of summer of late August in Louisiana. The first part of the summer is always
hot down here but in July most of the really hot days are alleviated by
afternoon showers, which, though making things steamier, provided a pleasant
respite from the oppressive heat. However
the last few weeks of August seem to have a way of becoming nearly
unbearable. With the last days of
summer comes a low level depression that sets in as people try to avoid being
outside for more than a few minutes at a time and find themselves cooped up in
homes and offices all day.
There have been several days in the last few weeks when I
was bound and determined to do a little reading on the back porch and enjoy the
sounds of birds and insects and the beauty of trees in the early hours of
morning. And yet my weak will gave
in and retreated to more hospitable climes within just a few minutes. And yet it is in those moments,
sweating under the oppression of summer, that words penned by the Apostle Paul
in Romans 8 begin to speak to me with particular clarity… creation is groaning…
I am groaning… all of us are groaning.
I find that by the last 2-3 weeks of August I am longing and groaning
along with the world of nature around me for the cool of autumn. I can’t help but wonder if this longing for summer to be over
isn’t somehow part of the very narrative of redemption and new creation
embedded in the very seasons of our world. As the opening verses of Psalm 19 declare:
1 The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his
hands. 2 Day after day
they pour forth speech; night after night they reveal
knowledge. 3 They have no
speech, they use no words; no sound is heard from them. 4 Yet their
voice[b] goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the
world.
I am writing these words on that first cool day that has
come in 5 months… that day that I have been groaning and waiting for. And it is every bit as wonderful as I
imagined. Yet I don’t want to
simply enjoy this day but rather to let it be a space in which I can remember
the bigger narrative, the groaning of creation that will once be liberated by
the return of Christ. I wan to use
this day as a springboard to join with creation in praising the King. So here’s to a beautiful day at the end
of a long summer and here’s to the beautiful day of which we still eagerly
await when our King Jesus will once and for all set things right.
