Awakenings...

I love this time of year. The sensation of more light, the conscious feeling of things waking up. I feel a sense of excitement as I look around and the winter crispness to the sun is mellowing and spring perches on the valley tops!
Driving back from the supermarket today, I looked out at the edges of the valley and saw the expectation of newness. It filled me with that addictive substance - hope! I drove along singing (as I have taken to doing) at the top of my lungs and I felt thrilled and liberated from the sense of winter gloom. The days are lasting longer and the air is fresher and I have laundry out on the line! Ahh! My heart swells and I feel a smile on my face.

Then, I had a connecting type of thought!
Against the background of these feelings, it's not really a surprise to me that the Lord ushered in the Restoration in the Spring.
I am not surprised that Joseph was moved to go and find his quiet spot out of doors and alone in nature.
If this is what I feel as the world awakens after just a few short months of winter "slumber", imagine the sense of expectation and delight that thrilled our hearts as we watched Joseph take that walk! As we turned to look at our Heavenly Father and His Son as they left to go and meet him. The time had finally come, after decades, even centuries, of gloom and spiritual darkness, the dawn of the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ had finally broken over the tops of the valleys!
"Oh! How lovely was the morning!" ... and I got a glimpse of it this morning going about the mundane tasks of life! I feel like Alma, who said that all things denote there is a God, even the way the sun shines differently in early March from the way it shines in early February! The ever present "signature" of this earths Creator written across the sides of the valley in a definite spring green!