At the Onset of Rest

The sky is filled with a heavy gray.  The pecan trees are bare, like skeletons against the sky full of endless clouds.  The ground is littered with the last leaves of fall which have danced one way and then another until spent beyond any hope of dancing again.  The brown earth burnt of all green lays ready to receive those spent leaves for tomorrow's nurturing.  Squirrels are running here and there burying nuts as if hard lean days are to come.  Crow are fussing that the abundant harvest is about done and deer are roaming about in a endless search for something still green.  Ah, winter is near; perhaps, according to some, here.  

Another view is that creation is entering into its Sabbath rest.  Since the first breath of warm air touched the air nearly a year ago, the creation has been at work.  Foliage started sprouting on trees.  The pecans began to show like small green precious stones.  The land started coming to life bringing it power to grow and nurture to the surface once again.  Crops were planted.  Fields were harvested as the produce of the earth.  For such a long time now the creation has been hard at work.  These days which have finally come to us are days of rest.  It is not just the dormant season, but the season of rest.   

Would that we mortals could hear the creation's word to us in these days?  Would that we could hear the voice of the creation as the Voice of the Almighty speaking to us about the order of life first ordained before the Garden?  Even as the creation needs this extended Sabbath rest, so do we need such rest interjected regularly into our lives.  Life is about more than producing and accumulating.  Life is about more than working and staying busy.  It is about living.