The Turn

I’m getting older. There I said it. The gray hairs when I get a haircut can no longer be hidden or explained. The pulled muscles from getting out of the truck wrong is even more evidence. Father time catches us all.

But this isn’t a blog about my aches and pains or growing old. As I come to terms with my increasing number of candles on my birthday cake, I often find myself questioning how did it happen? It seems like yesterday I was studying for finals in college or helping Michelle plan our wedding. I know the answer is obvious but often in our human experience it seems like we’re cruising along in life and then suddenly it all changes or at least that’s what we perceive. What are those points in our lives where we don’t see it coming but something happens and when we look back we are able to say there’s where it all turned?

I just recently returned from spending a few days at our farm in West Virginia. As I visited with friends and relatives and observed the post Covid world we find ourselves in, I began to think about those turning points. You see several members of that very small, rural community have recently passed. A lot of the conversations centered around what happens now? To the farms, to the lives and families? I thought as I visited the small, historic cemetery tucked quietly on the ridge top of the many generations that were buried there. Where did it all change for their families?

It would seem that one day a family is deeply rooted in a place and then the next day generations are gone and a house sits empty and abandoned in disrepair with grave sites unattended. There are several old homesites in the area that have simply been abandoned. Evidence of the houses and barns are clearly there but no human presence has been there in a very long time. There was a point, a time or an event that turned that rooted family home into an empty shell to be all but forgotten.

We can’t stop them, these events. The Creator has a plan for all of us and that plan moves according to His timing. My point here is that we miss these events, these “Turning Points” sometimes because we aren’t looking. I am guilty of marching to the rhythm of work, church, etc. and when a shocking event happens I find myself saying “wow – didn’t see that coming!” But did I?

Being present every day. Knowing those times comes and doing my very best to close the day fully aware of my friends and family. You see there was a turning point for those early followers of Christ. His death. He told his friends about it- a lot. But they didn’t hear or understand him. Kind of like the farms whose families just assumed someone would always be there. Jesus’ disciples got it after his death. They got it enough to change the world.

What if we got it? Got that we need to be ready for the unexpected. Got that what feels normal today may well be gone or changed tomorrow. Just what if we got those things a little sooner, understood the “Turn” would come when least expected and perhaps in ways we couldn’t imagine? Perhaps if we held our family and friends a little tighter and worked a little harder to stay in the moment, what a difference it would make.