Most of us love consistency.
Reliability. Traditions. Dependability. Sureness.
We love when we know what’s coming. We love when people don’t fail us and when things happen how we hope and expect.
Change is hard. Hard.
Maybe like me, there’s a lot of change happening in your life right now, some good, some bad, some you’re willing to share, and some not. But God reminds us:
To everything there is a season,
A time for every purpose under heaven;
A time to be born, and a time to die;
A time to plant, and a time to pluck what is planted;
A time to kill, and a time to heal;
A time to break down, and a time to build up;
A time to weep, and a time to laugh;
A time to mourn, and a time to dance;
A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones;
A time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
A time to gain, and a time to lose;
A time to keep, and a time to throw away;
A time to tear, and a time to sew;
A time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
A time to love, and a time to hate;
A time of war, and a time of peace.
Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 (NKJV)
I can check off a lot of those “times” right now. Can you?
I recently passed the mantle of President of Project Alive to my dear friend Kim Stephens. She’s amazing. I have complete confidence in her leadership and compassion for our Hunter Syndrome community.
That was good change.
Project Alive will thrive and continue to grow.
Little known fact, I actually never wanted to start a nonprofit. I balked for about a year after God kept nudging me. He reminded me, “For everyone to whom much is given, from him much will be required.” (Luke 12:48 NKJV)
With the unique skill set God had given me, I wanted to be serve our community, but frankly, I much preferred writing blog posts about things like insurance and equipment and clinical trials so people didn’t have to recreate the wheel, and even more, I loved helping families deal with this devastating blow one-on-one. I missed that a lot as Project Alive grew into what it is now (and yes, I know it helps many people in other ways also!)
But it’s hard to share your heart and love for people when much of what you do is paperwork, research, phone calls, and strategic decisions. But in those things, I also wanted to help make change. Change that would give people hope.
Where my hope comes from
I know that when you are told your child will deteriorate and die, hope is sometimes hard to come by. I was there. I remember it well.
But God always gently and patiently reminded me that what I was thinking of was earthly hope. And that we all (eventually) die.
I needed the regular reminder of eternal hope. A hope that doesn’t change and doesn’t disappoint. A hope that exists even though our future is uncertain. A hope that exists even in the darkest of times.
If you know me well, then you know my hope. If not, I need to tell you something.
If I loved you well, that was Jesus.
If I cried with you, that was Jesus.
If I advocated for your child. If I hugged you, helped you, strategized on clinical trials with you. If I gave you hard truths or just sat with you in the loneliness of parenting a child with special needs. If I laughed with you or made you smile, if I wrote something helpful, offered my time, if I was a friend when you needed one, that was Jesus.
Nothing I did as President of Project Alive was because I was special or smart or better than anyone else. It was all because God supplied the energy, the means, the will, and the platform for it to happen.
To Him be the glory for my five years serving in that role.
Like I said, sometimes change is good.
And sometimes, right alongside it, change will try to crush you. You know what I mean? The bitter and the sweet. The rain and the rainbow.
Abundant sunshine
One of the hard changes in my life right now is that my aunt Barb just passed away. To say that she was important in my life, and in the life of my kids, is an understatement (the video at the end of this post explains a lot).
One night she was at my house joking and laughing, then the next day she had a stroke.
And while we still had two weeks with her before she ultimately suffered a second stroke and passed away, I’m reminded again of how short life is. How much we need eternal hope.
In the week before her Celebration of Life service, there was a weather forecast that read, “Abundant sunshine.” Yep, that was her. I couldn’t help but smile. Now when it rains, I carry her favorite bright yellow umbrella as a reminder of her abundant sunshine.
Who is your “abundant sunshine”? Whose “abundant sunshine” are you?
In my aunt’s honor, some sweet little girls in our church body passed out her stylish hats for people to wear at the service. You can see some of them in the video below. And if you watch it through, don’t miss her joy at leading evening dance parties.
My remarks about Barb and what she’s meant to me and my family begin at around 33:00. May her abundant sunshine shine on you today as you celebrate or struggle amidst the change in your life.
Station Hill | Celebration of Life | Barbara Weirsma | April 7, 2019 from Brentwood Baptist Church on Vimeo.