For the past month, campus has been blanketed with snow, but as we now usher in spring, the weather is warmer, and the snow has dissipated. I want to implore students to enjoy the incoming sun while we have it. In my experience, the times when I feel at my lowest are in the winter. Not only is the distance between Winter Break and Spring Break prolonged in comparison to the other breaks we are given, but the workload can often feel like it’s weighing me down. Sometimes it may feel like the work never stops coming and you may need a break.

That break should be found in the weather we have right now. Not only because it feels good, but God has gifted us with the tranquility that comes with it. I often admire the people who choose to sunbathe with a book in the grass of the Quad or perhaps do their homework on a nearby bench in Parkwoods. There is something to be learned from those people who chose to bask in what God has created. When you take the time to listen to what the world has to say, I think we are gifted with true peace. 

Romans 1:20 reads, “For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.” For the most part I hear God’s voice best when I am in the middle of what he has created and present. This means without any other distractions. No headphones. No phones. Nothing but silence. It is in that silence that I hear the gentle whisper that God has to offer me about my situations, about my actions, and about myself. 

The verse in Romans tells us that what God has created has something to offer all of us. I think that we as students of God, not only of college, have to be willing to learn from what he has shown us. I can’t recall where I once heard it, but I do remember someone telling me that “God does not whisper because he is far, but he whispers because he is so close to us.” What if that closeness lies within what he has given us outside of our doorstep? Beyond your phones and past the distractions of the world. 

I don’t have the answer to every single question, nor do I want to act as if I do, but I do think that there are answers to be discovered in what nature does. The way that birds learn to fly, the way that cats struggle past the snowy nights of winter, or the beauty of  a butterfly surviving with a broken wing. Students have a lot on their plate and one missing assignment can feel like doom to some; I think in the grand scheme of what God has planned for us all and standing in the midst of the world that God has offered us we will see that we are so much more than our stresses.