Summer Sampler: In His Grip While in the “In Between”
This year’s Summer Sampler theme is “Persevering in a Troubling and Ever-Changing World.” Life can be hard. Sometimes, really hard. How do we persevere through circumstances that threaten to break us? This summer, journey with some women who have been through it and have come out the other side with a deeper faith and confidence in God’s love.
By Phyllis Bennett
Celebrate the seasons –– a time for everything! Solomon trumpets this theme in Ecclesiastes, championing that each season will be made beautiful in its time with God as its designer. There are only a few people in scripture for whom we have the privilege of celebrating their seasons over a lifetime: Moses, Joshua, David, and Mary, to name a few.
But we have seasons of our lives as well! Seasons come and seasons go. Some arrive suddenly –– with the death of a loved one, the loss of a job, a sudden move to a new city –– the plot twists of life we never see coming. Other seasons arrive so gradually that we barely notice we’ve entered a new season. When did our house become quiet? When did I grow old? When did Instagram replace Facebook?
With the fast change of seasons as well as the slow, each presents its own challenges. For me personally, it’s been the unforeseen plot twists that have deepened my trust in the Lord the most. Recently I experienced a plot twist –– a sudden loss of a job due to a million-dollar budget cut that forced the seminary where I still teach to eliminate several departments, including the women’s center for which I served as chair. Close friends were concerned for me with such a huge loss; the role had shaped 12 years of my ministry career.
But I had lived through this season of letting go several times before. It felt familiar. In my younger years of transition, I remember feeling petrified, angry, uncertain, often sleep-deprived. But this time it felt different. Years prior, during one of these transitions, God gave me a visual that served as a road map for how to get from one season to the next.
Trapeze artists know this road map well. They let go of one trapeze bar and stay suspended in midair for a short time until the next one is swung in their direction. And since my faithful God has “ordained all my days before one of them came to be,” I knew He would be the sole trapeze artist in charge of not only when that next trapeze bar would firmly fit into my grasp, but also the nature of the calling on my life that would accompany that next bar.
Here’s what God has taught me about how to get from one trapeze bar to the next.
#1 Listen carefully. Journal everything you hear –– particularly every verse, every insight from a friend or quote in a sermon. I find that God speaks the loudest when I am in midair. Hours in God’s Word will begin to form the blueprint of this new season. When the way seems foggy and uncertain, claim your journaled verses, trusting that God is working the night shift to swing that trapeze bar toward you at break of day.
#2 Choose wisely whom you allow to be on this journey with you. Well-meaning friends may have lots of ideas of what they think you should do with this next season. Choose friends who will listen with you, encourage you, dream with you. While in midair, you’ll need dream-supporters, not dream-killers!
#3 Revel in the fact that God saw this plot twist coming, though a surprise to you. Cling to the reality of Ephesians 2:10 (“ For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do”), that this new season will be packed with carefully chosen good deeds for you to do. His gifts and callings are irrevocable.
Take time this week to celebrate each season of your past life, reflecting on how God expressed His goodness to and through you!
And if you are experiencing a plot twist right now, take time to grieve your passing season while reaching forward to whatever lies ahead, trusting God when He says,
“Behold, I will do something new. Now it will break forth, will you not be aware of it?” (Isaiah 43:19).
Enjoy this midair transition until that next trapeze bar is firmly in your grip, confident that you are firmly in His!
Phyllis Bennett is passionate about drawing out and training up the giftedness in women so they can live out their God-given potential as a kingdom-builders. She presently serves as the Director of the Women’s Center for Ministry and the Coordinator of the Women’s Transformational Leadership Academic Concentration at Western Seminary where she teaches two courses: Develop and Deliver Life-Changing Bible Messages and Develop Life-Changing Bible Study Curriculum.
Her husband Dave is presently serving as Congress Director for the Lausanne Movement’s Fourth Congress in Seoul, Korea 2024. Dave and Phyllis have two married sons and eight grandchildren. Phyllis is a board member of by design ministries.