Is it summer or winter inside?

 
Have you ever read a quotation that makes you feel good, but you’re not exactly sure why it does? That’s how I felt when I read Camus’ “In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.” We have come to expect such memorable statements from the French philosopher and writer who, in 1957, was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. To translate his insight into less poetic terms, what I hear is, “When things get really bad, I find within myself a bright hope for tomorrow.” Very up lifting. We’ve all known bad times and quite often what we’ve felt to be tragic at the moment turned out far better than we could have expected.
         My problem with that somewhat rosy scenario, however, is that so often it doesn’t work out. It has not been my experience that every difficult situation has been solved by a new and fresh realization rising from within that convinces me of a better tomorrow. Many winter storms turn out to be less severe than expected, but not because of an “invincible summer” which lies within. In my experience, the storms of life are a very real part of life itself and are not melted by a warm summer sun that I possess. That which overcomes the current difficulty doesn’t seem to lie within me. I question not that a strong sense of optimism won’t deal with difficulty better than despair, but matters of the soul require help that will reach way deeper into the problem.
         The prophet Jeremiah wrote, “The human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is?” (1:9). I would ask, “Does the wicked heart contain an ‘invincible summer’ as well?” Perhaps this is not a Yes or No question. Those who accept the Bible as authoritative must of necessity agree to what it says. But in a larger context, is that all it says?” I think not. Fallen we are (Read Genesis 3 and Romans 3), but we were created in God’s image (Gen. 1:27). That means there is real hope for a coming summer. It was God’s intent that his offspring return to Eden, and for that purpose he gave his Son as the necessary price for redemption. Now that is the real spring!