I have many reasons to feel good about this time of year. The FedEx Cup playoffs begin in professional golf. The top 70 in year-long points on the PGA tour begin their quest for Player of the Year. Before you begin to yawn if you’re not a golf fan, I’ll move to other sports. Baseball is winding down the regular season, and football begins.

Students are heading back to school.

We are getting closer to the hope and promise of cooler weather, even though we still have a couple more months of oppressive heat

Our wedding anniversary and my birthday.

Here at JOY!, getting oh-so-close to being back in a newly “refreshed” sanctuary. Talk about a spiritual boost!

But I also think we’re entering a season, an undiscovered future, of renewal, refreshment, and revival in the Christian church. Maybe I should say community rather than church. We are gradually bubbling, fermenting into something we can’t quite quantify or explain. Maybe that’s the point. The Holy Spirit is up to something. It’s exciting, and we need spiritual connection, because it seems like the world we have allowed to emerge is careening off the rails.

an alarmingly minutes ago, I overheard in the pre-meeting chatter of our AA siblings that the gigantic Mendenhall Glacier in Alaska is melting at an alarmingly accelerating rate. Huge chunks are breaking off, resulting in flooding which has already claimed two homes. So there’s climate change, arguably the greatest concern to our planet.

The Spirit of Christ can and will speak into the news of our day and age. God will redeem and restore in due season. We may go through many more cycles of climate change, political upheaval, and man’s inhumanity towards man. Maybe 2030 or 2033 will be “the” year, the time of Christ’s return – two millennia since his crucifixion and resurrection. However, we know that God will thwart, upend our predictions and “guesstimates”.

In the temporal, physical, fleshly world, I can still rejoice about this season. My dad and stepmom, both 91, are ready to die. Not that they will sit on their couch holding hands and praying that God will take them right away. They still have much life in daily living to look forward to. Our times are in God’s hands. I can be giddy about sports to watch, temperatures that lower, occasions to celebrate, and a newly renovated worship space. But these will too quickly pass, and then it’s off to the next thing to anticipate. We all know that there are seasons of travail and suffering. We move forward one day at a time, trusting God’s tender mercies, amazing grace, and unconditional love.

Pastor Art