Sometimes Things Get Worse Before Getting Better

When waiting for change to come, sometimes things get worse before getting better. My family has experienced this so many times over the past several years. Often with things going from bad to worse to even worse. And recently, God gave me a good visual of this.

The home that my family and I live in has a small pond in front. When we purchased the home in 2018, there was a beautiful cypress tree in the middle of the pond:

We moved in during the springtime, and the prior homeowners remarked that we were in for a gorgeous display of color from the cypress tree when the fall season came around. And true to their word, that is exactly what we encountered. Below is a photo of the tree in November of 2018:

As November rolled around in 2019, I took a photo one day as the cypress tree began changing color. But we wouldn’t get to experience the tree in its full glory that year, because our son was in a life-threatening vehicle accident the day after I took this photo:

We spent the next month in and out of the hospital and much longer than that walking alongside our son for rehab and recovery. And we also faced several other difficult circumstances during this time.

Then the calendar turned to 2020. It seemed that we and the whole world were hanging on to hope of new vision that 2020 would bring. But as we all know, what 2020 brought was something that none of us would have foreseen, a year that would go down in infamy. None of us would escape that year unscathed. We were all impacted one way or another.

Like many others, my husband and I found ourselves closing the doors of our business in March of 2020, a business that we had purchased less than a year prior. So in addition to overseeing our son’s care and navigating other challenging matters, we were now trying to find ways to keep our new business afloat. Thankfully we were able to reopen that summer, but keeping our doors open for the next year required lots of juggling and jumping through hoops. 

We were also dealing with multiple other home and family issues during this time, as well as some difficult circumstances with extended family and life in general. It was quite a lot all at once. But when fall of 2020 came around, we were able to once again experience the beautiful autumn colors of our cypress tree:

We had hoped that 2021 would bring better days, but instead we faced continued trials and hardships, with multiple issues again hitting us all at once, including further traumatic situations. There were so many times when the best we could do was to make it through each day. The days were long and relentless. The weeks and months seemed to drag on.

Fall eventually rolled around again, and we eagerly anticipated the season’s color changes. But just as our cypress tree began changing color, something happened. The tree began to lose its needles while many of them were still green.

I remarked to my husband that I thought something was wrong with the tree. And soon, I began to observe what appeared to be some type of pods on the tree’s branches. This was definitely not normal. We would later discover that the tree had been infested with bagworms.

We weren’t sure if the tree would bloom again when spring came around in 2022. But to our delight, it bloomed and became as green and lush as before. However, it hadn’t been in bloom for long when it began losing its needles.

The loss was brief, though, and the tree soon began filling in again. But it didn’t stay full for long. The needles began dropping a second time, and this time, they would never come back. The rest of the summer and into the fall, the tree stood bare in the middle of our pond.

Which was exactly how we felt in our spirits too – bare. For 2022 had brought a similar scenario on other fronts. Areas where we were beginning to see new signs of life and hope of resurrection, only to have those hopes dashed time and time again. Every time things seemed to be getting better, something else would happen, and we would find ourselves facing situations that were even worse than before.

And it was no different with our cypress tree. By mid-October, it was apparent that our tree was dead. Not only that, but due to severe drought conditions that year, our pond had almost completely dried up too:

And only a couple of weeks later, in another traumatic turn of events, we found ourselves in the hospital with our son once again facing a life-threatening situation.

But unlike the tree, our son lived. And for that, we are ever so thankful. Yet what we’ve walked through since that day has not been easy. It has been a difficult journey with many twists, turns, and unwelcome surprises.

Meanwhile, we had been waiting since December 2022 for someone to come and excavate the dead cypress tree from our pond. Finally in March of this year, a crew showed up to do the job:

They were able to remove the tree, but unfortunately, they weren’t able to clear the pond or complete the clean-up. Due to heavy rains and flooding that we had been experiencing locally, the ground was saturated, and their equipment was getting bogged down in the wet, soggy ground – hard to believe given the drought conditions that had almost dried up our pond a few months earlier.

The ground would stay soggy for months to come as the rain continued to fall. And this is the view we had from our front yard while we waited:

An ugly, muddy mess. Even worse than it was before. Which felt a lot like other circumstances that we were continuing to face in our lives.

Indeed, sometimes things get worse before getting better.

Eventually the rains stopped, and the ground dried out. Our front yard is no longer a muddy mess now. Believe it or not, we are in drought conditions again.

We have completed much, though not all, of the clean-up efforts in and around the pond. And on the first day of September, my wonderful husband installed this beautiful fountain in the middle of our pond where our beloved cypress tree had been:

Though there is still work to be done, the pond is a much prettier sight than it was. And though the water level of the pond is low from this year’s drought, it’s better off than last year. And the water will rise when the rain returns, which it eventually will.

Plus, the fountain will now keep the water circulating in the pond. And the water from the fountain makes such a soothing, relaxing sound.

I had a chance to sit outside for a bit enjoying the fountain after my husband installed it. As I soaked it all in, I thought about all the hard things my family has been through the past several years, and how God has been with us through all of it. Sustaining us and strengthening us. Providing protection and rescue. Answering our prayers, though often not in the way or timing we would have chosen. 

But God has always made a way, many times when there seemed to be no way. We have witnessed His miracles. We have experienced His faithfulness. We have seen evidence of His goodness.

And we are beginning to see some things getting better. Things that we had first seen get worse. Things that for such a long time we had held out hope of getting better.

Things where, like our pond, we are finally seeing new life bubbling up where there once was death. Living water spouting where dead things have been excavated. A fountain of hope where there was once a void.

And though there are things that aren’t getting better, we still have hope and faith. Hope that some things will get better in God’s time. And faith that God is working in all things.

Even when we can’t see it. Even when things seem to be getting worse instead of getting better. Even when better days may not be realized this side of heaven.

For whether it is realized in life here on earth or life in eternity, God is working things out for our good and His glory. And if we keep with Him, He will take us from glory to glory. This is our assurance, that with God, it only keeps getting better.

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“My soul, wait silently for God alone,
For my expectation is from Him.”
– Psalm 62:5 (NKJV)

“But God will never forget the needy;
    the hope of the afflicted will never perish.”
– Psalm 9:18 (NIV)

“But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.”
– 2 Corinthians 3:18 (NKJV)