Love, Loss & Hope ~ a honeybee story.

I was headed home on that back road & there I saw it.

A “honey” for sale sign.

It’s that time of year again.

When summer crosses into fall. When the air is cooler in the mornings and the goldenrod is in full bloom. Spilling ochre to cover the fields.

Asters smile.

Their amethyst petals like bonnets round their flaxen faces.

And the honeybees….oh, they have been busy!

These are the months when beekeepers smell of sticky-sweetness and smoky embers.

Lulling the colony into a state of honey laden bliss, smoke rises and the bee-tender gently opens the hive. A peek inside tells the story of the year’s harvest.

Is the colony in good health?

How is the queen?

Have the 60,000 worker bees stored enough honey to maintain themselves over the coming winter?

And the question that my Sweet Louise always was so quick to ask, helping me amid the tall grasses there in the bee yard ~

“Is there enough honey to keep some for us too, Mommy?”

This harvest time has been different.

We wouldn’t be cracking open our hives. Nor tasting the golden honey from that fragrant, waxy comb warm in the Indian summer sun.

We would miss the mesmerizing hum in the fading light of an October afternoon. Bees making their way home. The last flight for the day, soon to be tucked in for the night.

Last year in November we lost all three of our hives.

Pesticides. Absconding. Such are the mysteries of beekeeping in our world today. But no matter the definitive cause, our hearts were broken.

Devastation left a bitter taste.

A year filled with tending to our honeybees had ended in heartache.

Somber.

Saddened.

We decided to take this year off.

Being without the honeybees has truly been bittersweet.

These small, wondrous creatures no longer interwoven into our days. Though painstakingly moving through our sense of loss, it has also afforded time for reflection.

Further evaluating technique. Considering direction. Pondering purpose. Examining intent.

…

Now, autumn’s beauty has returned.

Gathering warm colors of the season before the frost has etched branches and fields with white.

Harvest.

Abundance.

This time of year allows for a slowing down and taking time to steep in the wonder of this life.

And for a lover of honeybees, this is the miracle of the hive.

This masterful work of our Creator with its organization and intricacies.

It is the honeybee which sustains one-third of our food supply through the process of  pollination. Each tiny, golden bee returning thousands of times a day bringing nectar back to the hive.

Collecting pollen in their baskets.

A fascinating feat.

From grand design to simple joys.

Oh, the delight in watching the morning sun as it kisses the hive’s entrance. Waking drowsy bees as they fly off to forage in the early hours of day.

And the product of all of this work ~ honey.

Glorious honey!

One of God’s true marvels of nature.

Psalm 19:1

The heavens are telling of the glory of God; And their expanse is declaring the work of His hands.

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If you haven’t had the luxury of peering into a beehive, maybe you have read about or seen photos of a honeycomb.

The hexagonal cells are capped-off with wax at just the right time by the honeybee ~ when moisture content is less than 20%.

Only then is it harvest time.

The frame is pulled from the hive and the comb is cut free.

Then it is crushed and drained to collect the honey.

…

In contemplating my beekeeping story, I recognize lessons. Lessons that nature teaches us. Lending wisdom from Creation.

Just one of the ways that God interfaces with us.

Heaven meeting earth.

Honeybees are a perfect example of this. I think back to honey harvests past and I see connections. Likenesses.

As each of the honeycomb cells have walls ~ we too, build such boundaries. Boundaries around our hearts.

To protect the delicate contents.

From hurt.

From the invasion of the ugliness of this world.

So many more than six sides.

Walling ourselves off.

In doing so, gradually losing our sense of direction.

Perhaps one wall represents the beliefs that have shaped our false sense of identity. Lies of the enemy. Lies that we have come to believe. Building a thick resistance of shame. Of guilt. Telling us we are not worthy of love.

Another wall may be the pain of loss. Layers upon layers of blame and of hurt. Promises unkept. Dreams shattered. This wall keeps others from coming in to injure our tender hearts yet again. We remain behind this barrier, seemingly protected.

As humans we innately build walls of judgement. Pushing people away by criticizing their choices. Establishing disconnect, that we might not be tainted by their perceived wickedness or values that don’t align. Twisted illusions to make ourselves feel somehow superior.

And the greatest wall ~ that of fear. Fear of what may come to pass. Fear of illness. Of injury. Of rejection. Or abandonment. A thousand little bricks that are mortared together by a viscous sense of anxiety. Hesitation and retreat. A wall so prominent in our lives that it forms not just one, but many sides of our reality.

Over time, we find ourselves feeling cornered.

Suffocated.

Bound.

These walls that begin as small strategies to manage the difficult relationships, to resist the temptation of sin, to minimize the hurt from our past ~ they gradually become fortresses around us.

Blocking the true living of our lives. Reducing our experience to a mere shell of an existence.

Nowhere near the joy and abundance that our Father had planned for us.

How did we get here?

And what do we do now that we find ourselves locked away?

Isolated and alone.

All we ever wanted was to be loved and accepted.

Psalm 139: 7-8

I can never escape from Your Spirit! I can never get away from Your presence! If I go up to heaven, You are there; if I go down to the grave, You are there.

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This was the purpose of the Cross.

The real life sacrifice.

The physical loss to gain spiritual Grace. He did it all for us! This example on Calvary of the fierce and amazing love of our Father. He would stop at nothing to save us!

He came down from Heaven to rescue us from ourselves.

To reach down into our world and pull us out.

To break down the walls. To pursue us to the ends of the earth. Our Father who is forever chasing after our hearts.

That through our surrender we might find rest in Him. 

While we desperately try to place barriers between ourselves and this hurting world, He came to give us life in the midst of our pain.

That we could know freedom.

With the promise of a hope that this is not all there is.

That this world of crying out and breaking down is not our home.

For our Savior has come!

And one day we will live in eternity with Him in His Glory.

…

Like the beekeeper, Christ is the tender of our souls.

And as the honeycomb holds riches we, too, hold inside a beauty unseen.

With great loving-care, the keeper of our hearts comes to carefully crush the walls that hide us. One by one He breaks down the barriers that keep us from knowing the boundlessness of His love.

The walls that once held back our goodness, now gone. Like honey, His light flows freely through us. Speaking Truth to the broken.

Bringing His Kingdom to earth.

Our Jesus will crush any wall to get to us. He will break every chain that binds us. He will tear down every lie.

And no matter what we have done. No matter how unloveable we feel, He knows the soul of His child.

And He whispers, “Come take my hand.”

Psalm 142:7

Bring me out of prison, that I may give thanks to Your name! The righteous will surround me, for You will deal bountifully with me.

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His Glory-song is written in all of nature around us.

Be quiet.

Listen…and you will hear it.

The music that echos His redemption of pain and sin in this world.

His strength conquers.

His love abides.

And His hope ~ encouragement to try again.

…

And for this beekeeper ~ a joyful looking forward to hearing the hum of a new hive in spring!