Things Change

 

        Today's blog is a personal viewpoint on change.  Change for its own sake is neither good nor bad. It depends on the direction the change takes you.  We live in a world of change and how we respond is a reflection of us personally.  I'm going to focus and reflect on a few areas of change that have affected me, my life and revealed some of God's plans.

        Living arrangements change:

        My parent's bought our current house when I was eleven.  If you had told me then that I would one day be living in the basement, I would've bet anything that you were wrong.  Back then, the basement was the workshop/storage area.  It was creepy dark with one pull string light and a dirt floor.  It stored the lawnmower, paint cans, tools and probably a snake or two.  Along the way, my parents had it refinished into a real room.  Then a few years before I moved back home, the basement became their game room.  Then in August 2001, the prediction that I would've never believed came true.  I didn't accept my new accomodations with open arms, but instead referred to it as 'the dungeon'.  I felt like Paul, in my own kind of prison.  This change was instead a place of spiritual growth. 

        People change: 

        Yes, people change and yet, they don't.  All of our bodies change due to time, stresses, and the nature of humanity.  The same person still resides deep down under that aging, changing skin.  What changes most about people, who change drastically unlike others, are the  unfair judgements placed on them by others.  As for myself, the same Angie is still living inside the Angie now, regardless if she walks, drives, wears a mask, or breathes like you.  One of my favorite quotes is about the wrongness of assumptions.  "When you assume, you make an ass out of 'u' and 'me' both."  Changes within my person has humbled me and taught me a lot about acceptance.

        Abilities change:

        Hopefully, you can see life as a learning process where we gain new abilities.  My favorite of all my learned abilities is driving.  My driving skills began with a go-cart making burnout donuts in the playground dirt, then to a 3-wheeler catching air in the sand dunes.  My first car was a Dodge Aries K car then a Honda Prelude. Between these two cars, I'm partly responsible for the now 30 mph speed limit on McCain Blvd.  I gave up driving vehicles in 2003 due to my noticeable change in my physical ability to control my van at the time.  My ability to drive well now is used with my scooter.  While my ability to drive hasn't been lost over time, it has just changed in its format.

       God doesn't change:

       "“I, the Lord, never change,” God declares in Malachi 3:6.  So that’s where we start. Change means a move in another direction. For God to change would mean that He either becomes better or worse, and God is ultimate perfection. He cannot change because He cannot be better than He already is; and He cannot fail or become less than perfect, so He cannot become worse than He is. God never changes, and nothing about Him changes: His character traits such as love, mercy, kindness, justice, and wisdom always exist in perfection. The methods He uses to deal with human beings have changed through the centuries, but the values and purposes behind those methods did not."  [intouch.org]

       

         God built in us the ability to change.  For that we can be thankful, because we can change from our sinful nature and become friends with God and his heirs.  Changes brought on by God are always good and benefit us.  Reflect on the changes in your own life.