New Beginnings

I love this time of the year. Whilst I know my friends and family in the Northern Hemisphere are going into autumn and experiencing the first hints of a winter chill, we have Spring in September where I am. Heady Jasmine fragrance fills the air, and there are new flowers and buds everywhere.

It always reminds me of romance, and that wonderful verse in Song of Songs: 

Look around you: Winter is over;
the winter rains are over, gone!
Spring flowers are in blossom all over.
The whole world's a choir—and singing!
Spring warblers are filling the forest
with sweet arpeggios.
Lilacs are exuberantly purple and perfumed,
and cherry trees fragrant with blossoms. (Song of Songs 2:11-13)MB

New beginnings. Fresh oil. Fresh anointing, blessings, joy, new life, flowers and buds, bliss, rejuvenation, re-awakening, revival, renewal, energise, invigorate, excitement, refreshing.

Which leads my thoughts to one of the most powerful sentences in the Book of Acts, spoken by Peter:

So repent (change your mind and purpose); turn around and return to God, that your sins may be erased (blotted out, wiped clean), that times of refreshing (of recovering from the effects of heat, of reviving with fresh air) may come from the presence of the Lord. Acts 3:19 TAB.

We need this. New beginnings. Yes we do!