Ch-Ch-Changes!

I remember my first real office job like it was yesterday! The fear, the excitement, the coffee runs, and the stress! The experience I gained those three years, I’d never trade, nor the turn in the career path that occurred. I started there as an intern while I was still in college, where I was majoring in Accounting. I had these high hopes of becoming an accountant one day, a CPA. Instead of counting someone’s money, I ended up becoming a professional at spending it!

One phrase that I’ll never forget learning during that time was this – Nothing in life is constant, except for change. I was working at a thriving, expanding, national company, and there was something changing every single day it felt like. It was expanding so quickly, that it felt like most decisions and moves were reactionary instead of planned and strategic. Given, I was a very small fish in the sea, so my purview was quite limited.

As I reflect on that time, I think about how life can be like that. Life can be full of changes, big and small, and we can either be reactionary or maybe we can be prepared for them. You might be thinking, Kristen that’s just foolish! You cannot prepare for every situation in life, and you’re right! But, I truly believe the impact can be lesser to some degree if you’ve prepared yourself.

I’ve been through some major changes the last few months between work, community, church/ministry, living space, and friendships. One thing I’ve learned is what keeps me healthy amidst all of these changes, is what helps me stay even-keeled. It’s not just the things that keep me healthy, it’s the prioritization of those things in my life.

Here are a few things that keep me healthy: Bible Study, Reading, Running/Exercise, Balanced Diet, Rest, Going Out with Friends, Journaling, and Fun! When things get hard, I pull in and hide. I eat all the things, I think too hard, and I push myself to keep doing all the things. Notice these hit all my diligent goals – body, mind, spirit.

REAL MOMENT: I haven’t transitioned as well as I could have this last month. I’m trying to pull these all back into alignment, but it’s been a STRUGGLE. My current roommates have made the living situation super easy, it’s just finding my own rhythm! Part of it was tweaking my ankle a couple Sundays ago at soccer (it was worth the 5 goals though!), part of it is finding a new normal, and part of it is trying to find balance.

The most critical of all of those is my time in the Bible. I’ve been learning that I need to dig deep into the Word of God. Not just the daily devotional, not just answering some questions for bible study, but digging into commentaries and understanding context. It makes the word come alive, and helps me come more alive! In the process, it seeps into my soul a little deeper, I meditate on it a bit longer, and by thinking on it longer, I find ways to apply it.

Today, I decided to dig into Isaiah 40:6-8:

“All people are like grass, and all their faithfulness is like the flowers of the field. The grass withers and the flowers fall, because the breath of the Lord blows on them. Surely the people are grass. The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of our God endures forever.”

I chose this verse as we just finished a series at Woodside Bible Church going through Psalm 119 called Pages: Timeless, God-Breathed, Essential. It’s been a consistent theme that the Bible is a constant in an ever-changing world, and that when things change the principles and themes of the Bible can still be found to be true. There’s hope in these words, there’s life in the Word.

Charles Spurgeon said of the verses in Isaiah that “Unless our hope be in the Lord alone, that hope will at some time or other fail us; and this is a cry we need to hear because, until we are sick of the creature, we shall not turn to the Creator. Till we have done with false confidences, we shall not make God our trust.”

It made me not only think on how fleeting the world is, but how fleeting my own faithfulness is. Whether that’s to things like what keeps me healthy, or to other people. It’s why we cannot be for each other what only God can be. I find it jarring that Spurgeon uses the words “until we are sick of the creature, we shall not turn to the Creator”. It’s so true though, isn’t it? That sometimes it takes us getting into an unhealthy state about something, to realize that we are putting our hope in something that fails us. Hopefully, it forces us to turn to what heals us!

I’ve determined that there are actually three things constant in life – change, God, and His Word. We can believe that these things will always exist in life, and will never fail. But even though change won’t fail, we are never quite sure what that change looks like or how it will affect us/our lives. God + His Word are the same yesterday, today, and will be for all of the tomorrows.

I’m reminding myself of this as I see things changing in my life. I’m remembering what I have control over, what keeps me healthy, and the constant that I need to trust in.

 

 

 

(For all those who were hoping for it based on the title, I’m sorry that there was no Bowie reference! 🤣)