Leaves, transformations and transitions

Posted

By Jessica Tanner

Special to The PREVIEW

The air is crisp and the leaves shift from green to brilliant orange, deep scarlet, and lively yellow. Summer’s warmth slips away at autumn’s cool touch. Earth’s landscape transforms, as do our lives. Woven into each transition, or new leaf, of life is God.

My newest leaf in life is a job. I work part-time for the local post office delivering mail. Seeing God in a job that revolves around more paper than I knew could move in a day is not easy. Easy is spying the new scratches on the vehicle I’m using for the job. But God is there in my work. The morning exchange of news at the post office, brightly colored envelopes indicating remembered birthdays and holidays, and the warm hellos at mailboxes from customers are everyday acts of caring that represent God’s presence.

One day I came into work and the load of mail to deal with would never fit in my grandfather’s Suburban. I took my family’s advice of focusing on one piece of a project at a time. I selected a task and completed it, but the amount of paper and parcels to get through was still more than I could handle.

As the clock ticked away and the pile still towered, a co-worker offered to help, and I accepted. Her smile and act of kindness sparked hope in me. Together, we conquered the mountain of mail. God, like a gardener, nurtured my new leaf in life.

Our lives are full of transitions. God is there through all of them. When work seems like it will swallow us whole — as with my mail load — God offers us a hand in the form of our friends, family and co-workers. We are not alone in any endeavor. We only have to say yes. Because God wishes to nurture our growth, not stunt it.

“For He Himself has said, ‘I will never leave nor forsake you.” —Hebrews 13:5.