What do you do when your world changes?

The job market is drying up and you aren't sure if you'll continue to have a job or you've lost your job and you're not sure if or when you'll find another.

Youth moving from grade school into high school and then from high school into college or trade school or job market.

A shift from friendship to dating then engagement into marriage and then to family. A broken relationship that leads to separation and divorce with children questioning their place in the world.

From being healthy to being diagnosed and treated, finding a cure or not, living with limited mobility or declining mental capacity. Having health insurance and good medical care or not having medical coverage and losing everything because of treatment.

Having a mid-life crisis, questioning everything you've ever done and what will the rest of life look like? Being able to retire early and loving it or holding on because work gives you a sense of purpose and the thought of retirement is scary.

A shift from financial security to a downturn economy and limited income. Moving from your first apartment into your first home and then giving everything up in order to move into assisted living or nursing home.

A politically charged environment is moving people from support of their leaders to condemnation. People are demanding more for their particular cause all the way saying that government is already to big.

Some are in favor of laws that demand that a person carry proof of citizenship and yet are insulted when a bank teller asks for identification.

What are we supposed to do when our world changes?

For anyone that loves the study of history and pursues it in education or through life long learning, will tell you that the one constant theme throughout history is the instability of it.

The world, its people, plants and animals are living breathing things and the world is in a constant state of change. If for instance we build a dam, the dam changes the habitat surrounding it, but also above and below it. Anytime we choose to control things, something or someone else will wish to control it by another means. Our world is constantly changing!

The world around us changes when a store that we loved to shop goes out of business and we must find another. If a wrong diagnosis is made, we must suffer the consequences of incurred cost and painful treatments. One bad decision financially can have long lasting implications on credit scores and future economic stability. In other words, the one constant in our lives is change. How we deal with that change is what makes us or breaks us as a people.

As the world ontinues to change around us, God says "I am the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and end." In the scriptures when it appears that God has changed, it is only because of God's overwhelming love for Creation and the people who continue to make their mark on the world living as sinful creatures. It is God's love for us that continues to show forgiveness and grace and renewal in the world. You and I by virtue of God's grace find hope in the worst of circumstances and times. We find stability in the chief cornerstone of our faith, Jesus the Christ. Finally, Gods' Spirit is the driving force that pushes us into the constant changes of this world trusting that God knows our every need.

"If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land." (2 Chronicles 7:14)

Peace and Love in Christ,

Pastor Jaime