“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.”

Charles Dickens’ opening statement in a Tale of Two Cities very accurately sums up what we often feel during times of transition. Everything changes and continues to change. Sometimes the change is so prolonged that it seems even change is changing: What we thought was supposed to be the end result doesn’t seem to be anymore. Whether it is a forced transition or a voluntary one, there are paradoxical emotions and thoughts that swirl between joy and sadness, hope and discouragement, patience and impatience. Regardless of what precipitated our time of transition, during transition the unexpected becomes the norm.

THE PROBLEM OF FLYING THROUGH CHANGE
So often, we fly through our changes without truly experiencing them, without knowing the Divine’s deeper purpose in allowing them. We keep thinking that if we can just get to where we are going, everything will be okay, or that we will finally be happy when this is over. We may even tell ourselves that this should not be happening to us. Sometimes we simply move numbly through transition, floating through our days, as though not anchored to anything. This is problematic because in all of these states, we remove ourselves from our spiritual anchors.

ANCHORS
In transition we need anchors. Anchors tell us that God is in this change. His hand is working through all things and changing spiritual matter deep within our innermost shadowed caverns. We are somehow alert to the fact that when this transition is completed, our future will emerge — but we can never shortcut it. You see, transitional changes to our lives are actually meant to bring changes in our lives — i.e., the conclusion is not nearly as important as the process.

CLOUDED PERCEPTIONS
We don’t normally realize this truth until we have exited the transition. That being said, when we realize we are entering a transition, or a darkened place, we need to understand that our perceptions will be clouded as well. In these times, it is good to have spiritual anchors, prayer, biblical roots and friends to stabilize us. To God, these times are important enough to our future that they are worth His allowing them. Yes, our today’s are also important to God, but so are our tomorrows, and transition is one of His means of getting us there.

These spiritual anchors allow us to slow down our thoughts, to refocus, to take courage and to release faith in Him who is far more capable of managing our lives than we are. If we too speedily charge ahead, we neglect to live the life we have, the life He has given us. We become so intent on tomorrow, we lose all recognition of the preciousness of today; if we continue to speed ahead for too long, we risk missing what God has for us to learn. In such cases, we have to go through the process all over again, and that can turn pretty ugly as self-doubt and self-worth constantly lord over us and the darkness seems to thicken.

TRYING TO CHANGE CHANGE
What we will eventually understand is that the one thing we cannot change is change itself. No moment, no echo system, no ethos, however perfect it seems, can be maintained forever. Life moves on, and we are swept along with it. Life is a process, and we are all works of God in His process. It is only through surrender to our unknown future that we find stability and peace. It is through this process that true life actually becomes a stabilizing current that moves us toward the purpose for which we were created.

THE CYCLE OF PROGRESS
It is in accepting life’s processes that we become free to experience these bittersweet glories of transition. No matter how difficult, life is beautiful; no matter how beautiful, life is difficult. It is this paradox that releases compassion. It is through compassion that individuals are touched, lives are changed and others are provoked toward their destinies.

Everything in life has cycles: the Earth, the trees, the crops, even our daily lives. Our lives impact others, and our lives are impacted by others. In the end, it is that impact that determines our everlasting residence with God. I find that so much of my frustration with transition comes from my refusal to accept life’s seasons as they come. Without knowing it, I am trying to play God by determining how, when, where and what I am going to do. And so, as we mature, we find that beneath the turbulence of daily living, there is a longer, slower rhythm and timing to life. If we listen and catch our breath, we can come into a firmer union with that aspect of creation. When we do, we gain assurance, peace and the strength to recognize that God’s timing is better than our own, and it always serves our well-being. In this state of existence, the world does not control our daily lives. We abide in Him, He abides in us, and others notice it. Here we can ask what we want, and it will be granted to us.

It matters little whether we have volunteered for the transition that we are swimming through or whether we were forced into it. It is in God and His spiritual atmosphere that we live and move and have our being. He alone sets the stage for the purpose of our lives. With purposeful intent, He placed us here on this planet. He perfectly timed our existence for this very hour.

GOD’S GUIDANCE

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God’s Spirit runs through His children and is an inner river that is accessible at any time. We are constantly guided by that Spirit, and that inner Voice gives us focus and knowledge about the circumstances and situations we find ourselves in. It is during the turbulence of transition that we must actively, and passionately, stir ourselves to seek deeper meaning, higher perceptions and fullness of life in Him. It is here in transitional states that we grow in Him in leaps and bounds, more than we might have been able to grow in the past 10 years. We often learn more from 10 days of agony than 10 years of contentment.

Finally, when we experience a greater and “fiercer” transition, perhaps one that lasts longer than any other has, we can be sure of one thing — career changes are in store. By career changes, I do not necessarily mean changing types of employment, but that what is happening is meant to change the way we approach and perceive all matters of life. To those who are children of the Most High, life perception changes will always result in promotion, financial increase, deeper relationships and/or an abiding peace that all is well in God’s hand.

God does not trumpet when we are about to make these important life decisions. Why? because, He wants those decisions to be made from the fruit of our heart toward Him. The closer we are to Him, the better the fruit and the clearer the decision. Truly as we commit our ways to Him, our thoughts are established and through those thoughts the future becomes far brighter.

In my times of transition, I have found that it is great to have an end to journey toward, but in retrospect, it is actually the journey that matters in the end.

We know delight has been found when we look back and with deep heart felt passion, look God in the eyes and say, “The price was worth it.”

In my next post I’ll start to write on the Three Phases of the Dark Night of … .

Blessings,
John Paul

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Perhaps one of the ways to understand the third phase of transition is to understand the passage of Scripture where Jesus uses the analogy of the branches, the grapes, and the effect that pruning has on fruit production (John 15).

The whole idea of our lives on Earth is fruit production in all its forms. It is through fruit production that the Father is glorified (vs. 8). The way branches produce more fruit is through pruning and you guessed it – pruning is TRANSITION! The old is loped off or removed and the new is yet to come.

We may have been fruitful in our old life, career, house, ministry or any other endeavor we were involved in, but branches without the transition of pruning have decreasing yields of fruit. So the Father wants more fruit and rewards those who produce fruit with “Crowns”, but that is another story. Anyway, fruit is the idea, and I mean lots and lots of it! Why? Well let’s not get ahead of ourselves here. One step at a time, line upon line.

So how does desire, discipline and delight equate to grapes and pruning? Easy, you see transition begins right where we are - whack, we feel the uncomfortable sting of the vine dresser’s pruning shear. Cut to the nub, we are stuck where we are and hope something is coming. Slowly we begin to grow and we wonder what is going on. Weren’t we to move on? Why are we still here? Grapes may now begin to bud and even ripen. But, to our surprise, we will soon find this is simply the preparation for Transition.

DESIRE
Desire is displayed when the grapes are picked. You see the goal is not the grapes after all, it’s the taste, actually it is something far more precious than that. It’s Desire that stimulates our wanting to pick the grapes in hope of something fine and robust coming. It is desire for something more.

DISCIPLINE
The next thing we know we are thrown into a vat, a colander, or a wine press and the pressure begins. This is discipline and here we want with all our heart to escape from that which seems to be crushing the very life out of us. We seem to be losing the identity of our fruit. The grapes we worked so hard to produce, now have no identity of their own. And there in is the secret … God is more into wine than grapes!

DELIGHT
Delight comes in the drinking of the wine. Wine is not only the result of a loss of identity, it is the result of fermentation and that comes only after a very “smelly” time of hiddenness. We are not to be drunk or proud of our fermentation process as if this makes us more valuable, but with sober moderation we are to become the best wine in the feast! This is spiritual life at its best. It is the wine of the Passover, where God’s hand passes over us; a place where we become impervious to the attack of the evil one.

If we do not grasp hold of transition and embrace it, we are left a little more vulnerable to attack, and a little less confident of the nearness of God’s hand. We become a little dimmer light, and we lose a little of the salty savor that so spices up and preserves the world.

Few sights are as pitiful as branches that resist transition and are struggling to grow larger rather than to produce more fruit. The only thing worse is to see someone content to be “mash” in the bottom of the colander rather than wine in the glass. These are those who are content with the old wine for it is good enough.

We’ll talk more of the Delight of Transition in the next post.

Blessings,
arch enemy dead eyes see no future ep
John Paul

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