It changed a whole circle of friends and associates. I lost touch with many, but gained new relationships after the change.
Another significant passage for me was after being in the ministry for eight years, I was forced by circumstances to move to another circle. That departure was more significant than going from serving to selling. My wife and I left the same denomination of our families and growing up years, where my father has served for over 40 years.
There have been many other transitions since then. Over the years, I learned a valuable axiom about how to regard these significant passages. It came from something I read in an article written by a now retired columnist for the Boston Globe. Here is the excerpt that I have kept for over thirty years now:
“There is a trick to the graceful exit. It begins with a vision to recognize that a job, a life stage, a relationship is over – and to let it go. It means leaving what is over without denying its validity or its past importance in our lives. It involves a sense of future – a belief that every exit line is also an entry; that we are moving on rather that out.” – Ellen GoodmanSo many times, we think we need to “adversarialize” the past in order to justify the new transition. Exit lines are just that. Recognize them; take them; move on in gratitude and faith.
If you leave an Interstate, you don’t have to first find fault with it in order to feel good about off-ramping onto HW 50. You just flip on the turning signal, move to the right lane and take the exit.
I pray that God will grant you the grace to make graceful exits with gratitude for the past and maintain anticipation for the future.
“So, my dear friends, since this is what you have to look forward to, do your very best to be found living at your best, in purity and peace.” 2Pet. 3:14 (The Message)
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I want to be clever and say "I wish I had somewhere to go." But the truth is I am really grateful for this season. And I will be for the next.
ReplyDeleteI once heard John Duke say, "...if we didn't run out of grace for this season, we'd never want to move on to the next." So it does seem more comely to lean gently into the future when I find I am at or approadhing a threshold.
I remember the story about the mother eagle tearing up the nest to teach her young to fly - else they would not get out and embrace their destiny. Some exits seem like that.
Other times I have found myself calmly looking across the threshold of the coming season, knowing it is time for the old and familiar to be done, over, not-to-return.
In the wood floor business a threshold is thought of as a transition. I think it is because floormen create a convenient connection between adjacent floors, no matter how dissimilar in height or appearance they may be. We seek to make it easy to walk from one floor to the other - Kitchen, Back Porch, Hallway, etc. The process of putting a transition between two rooms sometimes requires more skill than is apparent.
Father's "transitions" are taylored to His children. Designed and installed to specifications beyond our chosing, but not beyond His grace.
That vision for the future that Ellen wrote of is THE key. Having that enables me to rejoice in Father's provision of the "transition" I need to step from this season to the next.
He is here. He is there. The next season wouldn't be worth having if it didn't require losing something. The loss is always less than the gain with Father.
Grace and Peace to you
Many years ago we took a family trip from Arizona to Minnesota. That particular year we traveled quite a distance on I-40, which was in a terrible state of disrepair. Potholes, ripples, cracks, uneven pavement - you name it, we dodged it somewhere across Arizona and New Mexico. But we didn't leave the Interstate until our PATH took us elsewhere. So, Glen, not only do yopu not have to find fault with the Interstate in order to leave it, you don't always leave it, even when there are faults aplenty. You leave when your path parts ways with the engineers' routes.
ReplyDeleteI love this! The quotation and the verse are very inspiring! Interestingly, I've been pondering "Graceful Exits" myself lately ---with emphasis on the grace part! Thanks ever so much for the timely insights! :D Take Care, Glen! :)
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