Change

What do you feel in your soul and in your heart when you think of change?  Does your heart beat faster with excitement...or with fear when you see change approaching?

The sermon at church last Sunday was about change...and I've been thinking about it for a while now...wondering how exactly does the idea of change impact my life...my feelings...my mental health...

Sigh...

I believe, if I know anything about myself, that I crave change in many aspects of my life...but...only when I can control it.  Change is exciting and fun to me only when on my own terms.  "Let's sell our house!"  "Let's move to another part of the country!" "Let's move to another country!" "Let's buy a house by the lake!" "Let's try this new restaurant!" "Let's redecorate the Livingroom!" "Let's remodel the bathroom!" "Let's quit our jobs and become freelancers!" "Let's sell everything and live in an RV!"  "Let's become nomads!" "Let's travel abroad in the middle of a Pandemic!"

Yep...that's me, alright. I don't want my life to be stale so I think of ways to make it interesting by moving things around.  I invite change.  The problem arrives when change shows up uninvited.  Then, instead of fun...change brings up gloom and despair...anxiety and fear...and the deep disappointment of crushed hope. 

It all comes down to a control issue.  I like to manipulate.  I don't like to be manipulated.

I've been planning a trip to Panama for a long time.  It's been 3 years since the last time I was there.  I have to go.  I have to see my loved ones.  I have to feel the tropical sun burning my skin.  I have to hear the noises and smell the aromas of my home country.  So, as soon as vaccines became available, I made sure we all got them.  We coordinated our schedules. We bought tickets and presents to bring.  We made reservations and plans where on their way.  Then, I get a message from my sister explaining how things have turned for the worse with the pandemic in Panama, especially in our hometown.  Reading my sister's words brought tears to my eyes because I knew: it is just not the right time to bring my family there.  The trip had to be cancelled.  

After months of anticipation and planning, we decided that it is best not to go to Panama this summer.

I felt the blow of disappointment deeply in my heart. I felt the stab of fear in my soul: fear that if I skip another year I might not see some of my loved ones.  I've already lost a few in since I last visited.  I felt the gloom and doom of my crushed hopes and dreams.  I felt the sadness of distance.

I felt everything but fun and excitement.

And usually, that's what unexpected change does to me: it devastates me.  And the reason it does is because I have a hard time looking at things and situations from a different perspective.  I'm so rigid when it comes to the way I like things, that when they change, I become frustrated.  Instead, that energy I spend in being frustrated, I should invest it on attacking change with change:  by changing my perspective.

Out of the broken trip plans emerge the possibility to spend vacation days that have already been set aside, enjoying a quiet, family getaway that does not involve airport security, flying, customs or strict pandemic limitations.  

I know this illustration is very mild and not life-altering.  Many changes we face in life have the capacity to inflict profound wounds and cause complete reversals of intentions.  But, in the end, an attitude of trust in the One Who Is in Control...on the One Who Makes The Plans is the perspective that we need to adopt every time we face the inevitability of modifications.  After all, there's much we do not know or understand, but we do know He is Faithful and Worthy of Our Trust!

 1 Corinthians 1:9 God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

Hebrews 10:23  Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.