Spring is not my favorite time of year. (Gasp!)

There, I said it. However, I am desparately wishing for it to arrive about now.

It’s not that I don’t enjoy green, growing things and warm breezes, for I do. I think it has something to do with the fact that spring is not “full-blown” — it’s a wispy, fragile season. Lovely, but not “all the way there yet.”

Spring is seeing my grandmother’s crocuses clawing their way through the sodden ground. Spring is trying on the pattern-pieced fabric of an Easter dress with a few straight pins poking through. Spring is a jacket on a school morning and wadding it up in your book bag on the way home. Spring is hearing the birds chirp as they build their new nests.

Fun things, but not completed things. The flowers aren’t in full bloom, the dress is not finished, the day is only half-warm, and the baby birds haven’t been born.

Ok, a little odd…..or call it impatience. The complusivity to have the blooms and skip the buds is something of a hindrance at times. It’s difficult to enjoy the process, since one is fixated on the finished product.

Yet, God’s Word and God’s World teaches us about metamorphosis. Seeds die, germinate, bud, and produce their fruit. Caterpillars spin cocoons, hibernate, and wiggle out transformed. People surrender to God, are adopted into His family, and start a growth process that never stops. The season of spring is supposed to teach us the art of persistence.

To me, one of the most frustrating aspects of spring is that it is halting — one day is sunny, the next three are rainy. It’s 70 degrees for one day and then 40 degrees for a week. Let’s get this together already!

Well, thankfully, God has more patience than I. He brings spring around every year to remind those of us antsy souls that there is a purpose for every season. He makes everything beautiful in its time, says Ecclesiastes 3:11.

While I’ll probably never prefer pastel yellow over watermelon red or pumpkin orange, I can remind myself that “driving time is also part of the vacation!” Skipping the incubation time leaves an egg that will never hatch new life. Pretty in the Easter basket, but serving no purpose.

Hail, Spring. We await your life-transforming lessons.