What Winter is it?

I was driving home a few minutes ago and heard on the radio that the temperature has dropped to 49 degrees. If you have lived in East Tennessee for most of your life, as I have, you know that it is "dogwood winter" or "blackberry winter" or "red bud winter" or something like that. There have been many names applied to the expected-unexpected shift from 80 degrees to clear, frost-warning nights. More than once I have been tempted to speak to the trees and call into question their sanity as they "bud" out too early and then suffer the consequences of the cold snap. I'm tempted to complain, but I know better. Change is expected. The weather is not predictable. Neither is life. Recently when I preached from the text of John 3, the words of Jesus took on a deeper meaning for me. As Jesus rebuked/taught Nicodemus a lesson from Spirituality 101 he drew from the principles of nature. We can't control the wind. We can't predict the wind. Frankly, we can't understand the wind. Jesus wasn't sharing a lesson for future meteorologists. He was sharing just how well he understands the human heart (re-read the closing words of chapter 2). My fresh view of this familiar passage speaks to just how difficult it is for us to accept this fact. We love to control, predict and understand. But, we can't. Our frustration with this fact often undermines our faith. I realize that faith is not just ethereal, without substance or form. Yet, we love to define faith in our own terms. When it comes to faith in God - God is never subservient to our own terms...wouldn't be God if He was. So, go cover up the plants and prepare for a cold night.