A Time For Everything (including change)

Change. Whether you like it or not, change is a fact of life. You're experiencing it now. You only get this moment once. Things will never be this exact way again.

If you're like me, reading those statements about change causes immense anxiety and fear. Your mind begins racing: what if the future is worse than the present? What if I can't handle the changes coming my way? What if, when things are different, I regret how I lived this part of my life?

To be honest, these are the kind of thoughts I've been caught up in lately. As a second semester college senior, I've often felt haunted by all of the impending changes. My life will look completely different in just a few months. I get so stressed about the "what-if's" of the future that I often miss out on what's happening here and now.

And, it's exhausting. It's not how I want to spend my last moments of college. But what's the alternative?

I have to stop being so afraid of change.

I must find hope in the midst of uncertainty.

I need to believe that God will take care of me.

These are the things I want for you, too. I want us all to live free of fear. But how?

How can I trust God when I have not the slightest clue what life will look like in a few months? All the uncertainty I've faced before now feels silly when compared with the stress of senior year. Until I know my post-grad plans, how am I supposed to live in the present? How do I avoid comparing my plans with everyone else's?

I'm asking these questions because I desperately need answers. And if you're asking these same kinds of questions as a second semester college senior or wherever you're at, I believe there is hope for you and I both. Let's find it together.

I've heard it said that fear is just having faith in the wrong things. In my case, it means believing what's next will be worse than what's current. When I am doubting God's ability to provide for my future I have faith, but it is in the wrong place.

The Bible tells me that God has good plans for my future (Romans 8:28, Philippians 1:6, Proverbs 3:5-6). My life is one long story of God's faithfulness and provision. And yet, these false assumptions are where I've been operating from in my everyday life. These lies are causing my fear.

I've got to stop living based on these lies. I don't want to spend the rest of my senior year feeling afraid. I want to be excited about the future. I want to trust in God's provision.

And to be honest, I'm not sure how to do this. I've never been in a season of life quite like this one. I'm confused and I'm tired and too often convinced that I'm alone in the uncertainty and doubt I feel.

But I'm not alone.

Even when my feelings indicate otherwise, I can be confident that God did not leave me here to figure this out by myself. Yes, being a second semester college senior comes with a lot of change, but so does life. All I have to do is stop for a moment and look around to realize I am not alone. Change is being experienced by every person, every day.

From the moment we are born. we are susceptible to an ever-changing future. Our bodies and minds grow with each day. We watch the seasons shift and nature follow. We're on a planet that's constantly moving. Everything about life is being constantly revised.

The truth about change can scare us or it can empower us. We can be anxious or we can be hopeful. But here's one thing we can't do: avoid change.

If we avoid change, life moves on without us. If we avoid change, we live stuck in delusion. If we avoid change, we don't grow into who we were meant to become. I don't know about you, but I don't want to miss out on growing.

Ecclesiastes Chapter 3 tells us that there's "a time for everything." It's been giving me a lot of peace lately, knowing that God has allotted "a season for every activity under the heavens" in my life and yours.

"A time to be born and a time to die,

a time to plant and a time to uproot" (v. 2)

"A time to weep and a time to laugh,

a time to mourn and a time to dance" (v. 4)

"A time to search and a time to give up,

a time to keep and a time to throw away," (v. 6)

Go read Ecclesiastes 3, and you'll see that life is filled with a multitude of opposites, all worthy of being lived. God already knows how every season in your life will unfold, even when you don't. There is purpose in all of it, the beautiful and the hard and the confusing and the mundane. But we can't get from one place to another without enduring change. We can't become who we were made to be without embracing change.

We must let the changes, change us.

I don't have answers. I don't have senior year figured out. I don't know my post-grad plans. But I do know that what's happening in my heart is not without purpose. I know that this season can build resilience and trust in me, if I let it.

I just have to make sure my faith is in the right place. I must believe in a God who will take care of me more than I fear what is unknown. That is my prayer for you, too, no matter what kind of change you're experiencing.

Let our faith be in the right place. Let our trust be in the God who controls our future. Let our peace be found in knowing we are not alone.