Fall:

Brilliant, blazing and beautiful!  It seems like yesterday when the leaves were beginning their journey from green to golden...and now, the chill and drizzle has begun.  The "rain" of old life has started to gently fall to the ground from where it began.  

So similar are our lives.  We begin tender and green - young shoots of promise bursting through the warm earth into the sunlight of hope and expectation.  Though our limbs receive some marks and scars from weather, they tend to remain supple and flexible for years.  

Sometimes there are breaks that create stunted growth or a bend in our posture.  Sometimes life's tragedies prematurely snatch us before our fall seasons ever come.  

But for the ones who walk through spring and summer into fall, there are often colors that accompany the journey; hues of red, orange and golden that are displays of wisdom and understanding.  They are joined by deep tones of past experiences that have included both pain and promise.  Real beauty begins to glow in brittled brilliance...more-so than at any other time of life!  

Let us remember those who have stood in the weather for many years.  Some on their knees - on behalf of the next generation - who would see them through their fall season and into winter.  May we honor and respect the contributions of those who sought to bring care, nurture and provision throughout their lives.  The mothers, fathers, care-givers, soldiers, fighters, workers, martyrs, and servants who are walking ahead and dropping their leaves of sound insight onto the ground where we will walk.

Might we recognize the beauty of the aged and find reason to smile on their offerings in a rushed world where the quiet and the frail so often fail to receive the respect or thanks due.  May their fall seasons be more pleasant due to the love and care of the green that surrounds their aged trunks and colorful leaves.  May what falls from their vivid foliage be gathered and embraced, for surely therein are the seeds of life and love to come.