Of Cold Fronts and Gratitude

Have you ever been outside when a cold front air mass came through where you were?  Before the front comes through, the old warm, humid air mass that has kept everyone miserable for several days blows in with southerly winds.  Then, for a brief moment, the wind subsides and there is a calm.  And in just a split moment, there is the first whiff of cool, fresh air on the north side of the front.  The breeze quickens and continues to cool things off in a very, very refreshing sort of way.  And you know that the big blue line you’ve seen on the weather maps in the last few hours has gone through you.

If you’ve never experienced that, you need to do so once in your lifetime.  There are several reasons for doing so.

1.       Change.  Things change.  Situations change.  Life changes.  Change is all about us.  We can embrace the inevitable, or we can continue to rail against it to no avail.  As Archie Bunker once said, “I like change better when everything stays the same!”

2.      It DOES get better.  The staleness and stagnation of the old, humid air mass gives way to refreshment and coolness.  The spirits of people are lifted, and things perk up.  It’s the same with life.  It WILL get better.  There are many downers in life, but there are the peaks as well.  Look for them.

3.      Provision.  There is indeed a Provider who knows what His creation needs and sees to it that those needs are met.  Colliding air masses promote rainfall, change of season, and other benefits.  Our needs are being met as the blue line of the cold front passes through us.

4.      Gratitude.  We live in a generally ungrateful world.  We humans believe, for the most part, that we make ourselves into what we are and have to look out for ourselves.  To an extent, that’s true.  But there are many things about life and living that we haven’t any idea how to control or manipulate.  The weather is one of them.  That front will come through regardless of what humanity may do to slow it down or speed it up.  We need to have a measure of gratitude for those things which come our way purely from the grace of a merciful Creator.

Whatever your taste in weather…rainy, foggy, snow, cold, warm, cloudy…whatever it is, some time take the time to follow an air mass as it creeps closer to you, then plan to be outdoors when it comes through.  And think of the lessons that it brings to you.