From Change to Peace - The Missing Link (TRUST)

You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you.
Isaiah 26:4 ESV


We're in-between basketball games, and our van is heading for home. It's lunchtime. Sam has invited a friend along. The two have been buddies for a number of years.

I listen to them laugh, share, and exchange still-little boys things, but I notice that their voices are different than they were just months ago. They're no longer small-son soft. They're at that longing place, that in-the-middle place, the stretch of being a boy that looks over the shoulder at childhood but hasn't quite arrived at the place of being a young man.

And I know hard and fast that we're looking at change.

Those who know me well (or maybe even those who don't) understand that change is my most uncomfortable thing. In fact, it hurts. It may be true that fretting over change is my signature sin. Whatever I want to call it, change makes me sad in the most deep, quiet place.

I love exactly where I'm at. How can I know that things can ever again be this sweet?

It's a question that rattles in my heart most of the time. And why? Because change never stops. We recently re-launched Logan back to school. It's best. It's good. I couldn't be more certain or happy for him. But packing his things, loading the van, waving goodbye once more...it's crazy- clear that watching my kids change is not a spectator sport.

When my kids change, I have to change, too.

All the kicking and screaming in the world won't hold time.

I glance behind me and catch these boys in the rear view mirror. There they are. Framed for an instant. But not held still.  And for a moment, I catch my own eyes. And I don't like what I see.

It's fear.

Fear of losing.

And suddenly the depths of my own murky heart come clear. What I'm really struggling with, what I'm truly wrestling with, isn't change at all.

It's trust.

Because in the center of me there are nagging questions...


Lord, will I still have purpose when my children are grown?
Lord, will my heart be full even when my mama-arms are not?
Lord, can I trust you enough to open my clenched fists when I want to hold tight to what I hold dear?

I pull into our drive and the pre-teens spill from the van. They're through the gate and down the stairs and across the patio to the back door. Will I arrive, to a strong place of trust, to a not-fearful place, as easily and surely as I've just come home to set these hungry boys free?

No. Surely not.

But I'll get there. In God's goodness and grace.

Because I want to move from fear of change to peace. And I've found the missing link.

Lord, help me to trust you with my days, my life, when we're heading for change. Amen.