Wasn’t it yesterday that we forgot the chicken in the microwave? That day when the nurse called to tell me that my strep test came back negative, but my pregnancy test came back positive, and in our delirious excitement we neglected the chicken thawing in the microwave for dinner, forgot about it until breakfast, and went out for celebratory pizza instead? Didn’t that just happen?
Wasn’t that baby just born, that sweet pink baby that kept us up at night, that toddler with the infectious laugh and lively eyes, who learned to ride a bike, then mow the lawn, then shave? How can it be that, days ago, we dropped that baby, kid, young man at college? Seriously, how is this possible?
These past few months, my heart has been stuck in my throat. Emotions and thoughts churned so thick I was unable to write. I needed to live through some of it first, be in these past three months that resembled a country song:
We said goodbye to our dog
our home
most of our stuff
jobs.
We said goodbye to our boy.
And it was all hard.
This isn’t meant to be woe-is-me. There’s good in all of this, and I’ll get to it in a moment. But first you gotta mourn. Before you get up, dust yourself off, and count your blessings, first you need to cry.
The good in all of this:
By God’s good grace, we gave our dog to a dog-loving woman who’ll give her a good life, better than we could give her in London.
By God’s good grace, we sold our house in four days, have friends who helped us move and clean, and family to welcome us in.
By God’s good grace we slowly but surely handled every last possession, weighed its worth, made a decision, and moved on to newfound liberation.
By God’s good grace, we have a wonderful, loving, hard-working son who is embarking on a new exciting chapter at college, a son we still get to parent, but in a different way.
And by God’s good grace, even though this season is foreign and frightening, it’s also exciting. Because while this season feels out of our control, it’s very much in the control of the Lord of days and seasons and minutes and hours, the God who wields time. The God who holds time, the God who made time.
From the beginning, when God separated darkness from light and called it a day, counted out six of those days and showed us how to rest on the seventh, he was the Lord of time. Days, weeks, months, seasons and years, we’ve never had control over it. Yes, we mark our calendars (diaries for my UK friends) and structure our moments, striving to make the most of every opportunity (Eph 5: 15-17, Col 4:5-6). But where is the scientist, or athlete, or billionaire, who can manipulate one second? Who can stop the sun from rising, who can freeze a moment until she’s ready to let it go?
Leaves fall,
Friendships form,
Children grow up.
All in God’s time.
All in God’s good time.
Show me O Lord, my end and the measure of my days. Let me know how fleeting my life is. You, indeed, have made my days as handbreadths, and my lifetime as nothing before You. Truly each man at his best exists as but a breath. – Psalm 39:4-5
Rachel Allord 
Leave a Reply