“The world for which you have been so carefully prepared is being taken away from you by the grace of God.” -Walter Brueggemann

Change is inevitable. Come to Expect it. – Anon.  I heard this as a teenager and hated the saying. I wanted to keep the fun parts of my life going on forever! Why would I want change?

The only constant in life is change. – Anon. I found this on a bookmark in a parking lot one summer. I had big plans to help build a storage building at a Homeless Shelter in a few days. That same day I tripped over the dog’s tie out, fell in our driveway, and broke my arm. I was not going to be able to help at the Shelter, or cut up my own food, or use my arm and hand for quite sometime!

I heard a minister preach once that control is an illusion. I argued with him all the way home from church. Now that I am older and wiser I know he was right in every way!

Do you remember the song “To everything turn, turn, turn, there is a season, turn, turn turn?”  Wikipedia says: The lyrics are taken almost verbatim from the book of Ecclesiastes, as found in the King James Version (1611) of the Bible (Ecclesiastes 3:1-8), though the sequence of the words was rearranged for the song. Ecclesiastes is traditionally ascribed to King Solomon who would have written it in the 10th century BC, but believed by a significant group of biblical scholars to date much later, up to the third century BC.

To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, a time to reap that which 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 together;
A time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
A time to rend, 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.

The Biblical text posits there being a time and place for all things: laughter and sorrow, healing and killing, war and peace, and so on. The lines are open to myriad interpretations, but Seeger’s song presents them as a plea for world peace because of the closing line: “a time for peace, I swear it’s not too late.” This line and the title phrase “Turn! Turn! Turn!” are the only parts of the lyric written by Seeger himself.The song is notable for being one of a few instances in popular music in which a large portion of the Bible is set to music!

Humans do not like change, regardless of age, race, nationality, religion, ethnicity, or gender. Guess that is why we need grace and patience as life unfolds! Try to go with the changes today.