"How to Handle Life's Transitions"
By Dr. Mickey Anders
First Christian Church
Pikeville, Kentucky
June 6, 1999
Text: Genesis 12:1-9
After moving my family 700 miles from Arkansas to Kentucky just last week, I find myself identifying more and more with Abraham. I wish I could say that I had his great faith, but I'm afraid that all I have in common with him is changing my address. I have moved a lot in my time.
Even today when I call home to talk to my mother, I always identify myself as the Prodigal Son. My parents and my brother have always lived in Crossett, Arkansas. Both of them have had the same phone number all their lives. But I was the prodigal son who went off to college, and then to seminary, and then to that peripatetic life of a minister. As best I can recall, I have lived in ten different cities in my adult life.
I am certainly not the only one who has moved so much. When I picked up the Ryder truck last week, the manager told me this was the busiest moving weekend of the year. One local man said he could have rented 100 more trucks if he had had them on the lot. We are a mobile society.
Our Scripture today is about Abram (and for convenience I will refer to him by his later name, Abraham), a person of great faith who heard God calling him into new places and into new faith adventures.
The story of Abraham marks a major transition in the Bible. In it, we move from a general, universal history of the world to a particular history of God's Chosen People. After the Tower of Babel incident, the people were "scattered abroad over the face of all the earth" (11:9). But God had not given up on them entirely.
When Adam sinned, God still allowed him to live and clothed him to cover his shame. After Cain's sin, God put a sign upon him to protect him. After the flood, God promised Noah that he would never destroy mankind again by such a great catastrophe, and he gave a rainbow in the clouds as a sign of his covenant. God's mercy had always followed man's sin.
But after the sin of the Tower of Babel, God called one man to be the channel of his saving grace to the world. Abraham was a righteous man and upright in character. God called him to be a blessing to "all the families of the earth." God's redemptive purpose for the world had now become focused on a specific person. God would now speak to one man.
God's call demanded a response on the part of the man. It was not easy to follow God. Abraham was asked to leave his country, his relatives, and his family and go "to the land that I will show you" (12:1). He was to rely entirely upon God. If Abraham obeyed, God would bless him. In fact, the word "bless" is such a key word that it is used five times in two verses (12:2-3).
Abraham's response is described in one Hebrew word at the beginning of verse 4, which is translated "and he went." We don't know the anxiety and careful deliberation that must have gone into that decision. We don't know how or why Abraham decided to respond to this radical call to pull up his roots and plant them far away. In typical Biblical fashion, all of those emotions are summed up in the one Hebrew word - "and he went." It was an act of silent obedience that changed the course of world history.
As Abraham moved from place to place, two things trace his wanderings - the tent and the altar. In fact, the tent and the altar may be symbols of Abraham's life. The tent represents his earthly pilgrimage from place to place and the altar represents his utter reliance upon God.
Perhaps we can learn from Abraham how moving can be a blessing and not a trauma. But you don't actually have to be moving your furniture for this lesson to apply to you. Really we are talking about how to handle the transitions in life. Everybody is faced with moving, even if it is moving from one stage in life to another.
Perhaps you should think for a moment about the transitions taking place in your life. As I look over this congregation, I see people who are facing all kinds of life transitions. Some are adjusting to the empty nest for the first time. Your kids have recently moved out leaving just the two of you alone in that big old house, which seems incredibly empty. Several of you have had deaths in your family recently and you are being forced to move to a place in life without that loved one. Some of you have just graduated from high school or college, and you are making the transition to another stage in life. Some of you have new babies and are still adjusting to getting up in the middle of the night. Some of you are home from college for the summer. Thomas Wolfe said, "You can't go home again," but here you are. And you are finding that home isn't what it used to be. Some of you are facing new jobs or new responsibilities in your jobs.
These are just some of the many ways in which we can identify with the lessons that come from Abraham. Abraham can help us learn how to handle life's transitions in ways that are healthy, wholesome, creative and redeeming.
The first thing Abraham did was to listen. In the midst of life's transitions, we are often surrounded by the noise of confusion and that dreaded word - "change." Everybody has a certain fear of change, but everybody has to face change more and more.
One of the great characteristics of Abraham was that he listened to the voice of God. Abraham heard the voice of God saying, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house..." (Genesis 12:1).
Now I must confess to you that I have never heard God speak to me in an audible voice. I have known some people who claimed to have heard the actual voice of God speaking to them. But for me, God's voice has always been a challenge. It has most often been that still, small voice spoken of in the Bible.
Do you ever wonder if you are doing God's will? I have, lots of times. The most important lesson I have learned in my old age is the importance of that still, small voice deep within me. When I was young, I thought all decisions should be made on the most rational of bases. Make a list of the pros and a list of the cons, and pick the side with the shortest list. But now I know that God's will is subtle, but clear.
There have been times in my life when I was out of God's will. During those times, everything in my life felt wrong. I struggled with that feeling that something, in fact most things, just felt wrong. When you have wandered in that wilderness for a long time, you just know it when you come to the Promised Land.
It's difficult to know God's will in advance. Hindsight is still better than foresight. Sometimes we have to pack our tent and move around until we find that place that feels right. But the key to knowing is to really listen to that inner voice within you. Abraham would teach us to stop and listen to that still small voice. Keep moving until you find that deep satisfaction of knowing you are in the right place.
Which leads me to the second lesson from Abraham, he knew what his Promised Land was. Maybe you need to ask yourself, "What is my Promised Land?" This question may clarify what you see as important in your life. It may reveal your deepest values and commitments.
What is the Promised Land God wants to call you into?
For most of us, we think of our Promised Land as the place flowing
with milk and honey. We picture it as a place where we can lie on
the beach with no responsibilities. We want to have all our selfish
desires fulfilled.
But it is more likely that God is calling us to a ministry. Our Promised Land will probably be a place where we serve others in the name of Christ, where we carry a cup of cold water to those in need, where we become serious disciples of Christ, where we share the Good News with those who need a touch from God.
Just as Abraham was called to be a blessing to the nations, I believe God calls us to make a difference in the lives of others. Maybe God is calling you to spend a day or more this week building a Habitat for Humanity house. Maybe God is calling you to invest a week in sharing to the love of God with children in Vacation Bible School. Maybe God is calling you to join the Sunday School class and take the Bible more seriously. Maybe God is calling you to spend a week on a mission trip to a foreign country. Maybe God is calling you become a special friend to one of the youth in our church. Maybe God is calling you to read the Bible through. Maybe God is calling you to start a daily devotional time. Maybe God is calling you to work with our Helping Hand organization.
While there is certainly a time for lying on the beach during a vacation, God is most likely calling you to the Promised Land of service like he was for Abraham. "I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing" (Genesis 12:2).
When Abraham heard the call, he packed his tent and moved out. Abraham changed his address, but he never lost his sense of place. The first thing he did when he arrived was to build an altar to God.
And that is the third lesson we should learn from Abraham - build an altar no matter where you are.
The altar is a symbol for meeting with God. We can affirm the lofty theological statements that God is everywhere at the same time, but we need to know where we are meeting God right now in our lives.
Where is your altar to God? In the midst of all the changes going on in your life, where is God? In the midst of all those moving trucks and boxes, where is God? In the midst of sickness and death, where is God?
We need to symbolically erect an altar to God in the midst of all our circumstances. God calls us to faithfulness in the midst of life's transitions. God calls us to see that we are on a spiritual pilgrimage just like Abraham was.
The story of Abraham's call and his response in faith inspires many of the New Testament writers. In Hebrews 11:8-10, the writer says, "By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place where he was to receive as an inheritance, and he went out not knowing where he was to go. By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise. For he looked forward to the city which has foundations, whose builder and maker is God."
Just as God made a covenant with Abraham, God makes a covenant with us through Jesus Christ. Through our faith in Christ, we become participants in God's marvelous grace. His redemptive plan is still unfolding, even in the midst of our transitions. We need to stop and listen in the midst of life's transitions so that we can hear the call of God. We need to discover the Promised Land that God calls us to claim. We need to build an altar to the Lord wherever we are.
A television documentary showed blind skiers being trained for snow
skiing. That sounds impossible, doesn't it? Paired with sighted skiers,
the blind skiers were taught how to make right and left turns. When that
was mastered, they were taken to the slope, where their sighted
partners skied beside them, shouting, "Left!" and "Right!" As they
obeyed the commands, they were able to negotiate the course, and cross
the finish line, depending solely on the sighted skiers' word. It was either
complete trust or catastrophe.
What a vivid picture of the Christian life! In this world, we are, in reality, blind about what course to take. We must rely solely on the One who is truly sighted - our Lord. Christ's Word and presence in the Spirit give us the direction we need. (1)
Faith is most often discovered in the midst of change, crises and transition. Just remember to be like Abraham, pack your tent and build an altar.
(1) Adapted from Robert W. Sutton, Leadership, Vol. 9, No. 4.