subject: Coping With Change, Today [print this page] 'God, grant me thepeace of mindto accept the things I cannot change; the courage to change the things I can; and the wisdom to know the difference.'Reinhold Niebuhr, German American Theologian, outspoken critic of the employment practices of Henry Ford and other production line owners
We have come back from vacation having been together as a family for 6 weeks. My eldest son has started a new school, my younger kids (who fight more when together) are now in the car every morning and evening. There's a mountain of washing, sports schedules and other activities, time that was my own or ours to share is now crowded with priorities.
I feel really odd. Like I just woke up from a dream. The weather is different, the sky is different, meal times are different. I miss us being together, doing stuff in a happy bubble of 'shall we?' rather than 'we must'. I miss walking down a dirt track with the Lord rather than asking Him to help me work out my day. Times change. Seasons alter. Life turns.
Transition. Moving from one place to another. Changing jobs, being unemployed, being ill or in constant pain, betrayal, having a baby, losing a baby, falling in love, being cheated on, divorce, addiction, an enormous bill, moving town, the death of someone you love,finding out something you wish you didn't know, a letter that changes your life for the better.
If you think about times of transition in your own life, what comes to mind? Joy, fear, jealousy, love, anger, laughter, tears or a mix of them all? Do you like how you handled your most important transitions? Would you or do you do things differently now?
Transitions are stressful because for a time,we are neither one thing or another. There's a reason why it's acknowledged that the most stressful times in life are when we are in transition. When something is changing forever.
Jesus said that we should pray for daily bread. He knew we would face many days when we would need something extra special to strengthen and sustain us when we were neither one thing or another. When yesterday's clothes did not fit anymore. When people, places or thingswe took for granted would belost tous.
Daily bread. Whatwe need for the dayswe feel panicked, overwhelmed, unsure, paranoidor generally undone. His life in our death. His gift in our loss. His peace in our chaos. His way out ofthe shadows into the light.
