Unchangeable Change

I don’t particularly like change.

My husband and I had been “empty-nesters” for about four years. We were pretty much adjusted to the life of a twosome. Then this past October our daughter and son-in-law and their four young children moved in with us while they sold their house in Maryland and found another home in PA. Ten months later, we were used to the liveliness of eight people in the house. Last week they moved into their new home and we were hurled into an empty nest all over again!

I wish that I could freeze time…. I’d love to stop the clock when all my children are happily married with children of their own, when they all live within thirty minutes of my house, when my husband and I are getting along famously, when the whole family is in total agreement on matters of religion and politics, when each member in our family, as well as our extended family and closest friends are healthy and happy, and of course when my husband and I look and feel fifteen years younger than our age and are totally capable of living independently!. Let time stop right there!

But it never does! It marches on. Each day and every encounter brings change of some kind. It’s inevitable. No matter how much I wish it otherwise, I can’t change the reality of change.

So what can I do?

I’ve tried some poor approaches… crying, complaining, resisting, running. None of these change the change. In fact they usually make me feel worse!

There must be a better way…

I the Lord do not change. (Malachi 3:6)

Heaven and earth may pass away, but my words will never pass away. (Matthew 24:35)

Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8:38 & 39)

Ah… the Unchangeables: God, His Word and His love. Three glorious unchangeables! Three rocks that will not move no matter how many people or circumstances threaten to turn me upside down.

The old hymnwriter wrote, “I don’t know what the future holds, but I know who holds the future!” I’d put a little different spin on that…“I do know what the future holds…change (more and more change, every day change, unrelenting change… changes I like and changes I hate). But in the midst of them all God and His Word and His love will be there. They will support me. They will comfort me. They will help me.

Perhaps change isn’t so bad after all.