It’s transition season. Our church has filled back up as people returned from their summer travels. Starbucks just rolled out its fall menu and the pumpkin spice wars have begun once again. School has begun and everyone is in a new grade, with two of our kids also starting at new schools.
The birds are putting on their migratory weight, molting into their fall colors. We are preparing to say goodbye to our autumn migrants—the Black-headed Grosbeaks, Lazuli Buntings, and most of our warblers. I get a little pang when I realize we are only a few weeks away from saying goodbye to the Yellow Warblers, brightly colored, frenetic little birds that like to sit at the tippy top of trees singing their song—Sweet, sweet, I’m so sweet.
Transitions are hard.
When I was in labor with our firstborn, a few hours into our hospital visit, stubbornly refusing all painkillers, I started screaming in earnest. Convinced I was going to die, I thrashed and yelled and told everyone in the room—the nurse, the doula, my husband—that no one was helping me.
“She’s in transition,” the nurse told my husband in a low voice. “This is what it’s like.” Dilating from seven to ten centimeters is, for many women, the most painful part of labor. It feels like being ripped in two. It feels like the prelude to death.
A few weeks ago, each of our kids brought Big Feelings™ home. The fantasy our five-year-old had about kindergarten did not live up to expectations. She told us through tears that there was barely any time to play. Our middle kid discovered that none of his close friends would be in his class and came home devastated, telling us that everyone else already had their friends and there was no one to sit with at lunch. Our oldest navigated the halls of his massive middle school for the first time, seven classes spread across a wide campus, lugging a cello.
“It’s really fun,” he said. “And I am so tired.”
By Friday evening we all collapsed in front of a documentary on killer whales with cheesy garlic bread and soft blankets, staving off the knowledge that we would have to do it all again in just a few days. Every single one of us went to bed early.
Transitions are hard.
I’m in transition myself, recently shifting from a half-time pastorate at our church to three-quarters-time, picking up the oversight of our Care Ministries as our current Director of Care prepares to retire. I’m both looking forward to it and occasionally waking up in a cold sweat—pastoral care is one thing a church really doesn’t want to get wrong. What will I forget? Who will I miss? How can I figure out how to work the new on-call phone system when I am completely technologically challenged?
I know I can do it—I love care ministry, after all, and after ten years at this church, I know most of our people quite well. But it’s the newness of it all that has me spinning. Going from a familiar and consistent schedule to one that is more on-call based will be a big change.
My struggles give me empathy for our kids. What a brave thing it is to walk into rooms filled with new faces, uncertain dynamics, and unclear expectations and not only survive but learn and grow and make friends. It gives me empathy for myself, remembering that all change—even good change—is difficult. All change brings with it a sort of grief.
My friend Anna is a pastor out on the east coast, and in our conversations she reminds me again and again of the wisdom of gentle Jesus.
“Go gently,” she tells me. “Be gentle with yourself. Be gentle with your kids. Be gentle with your congregation.”
In a bombastic, hurried, harried world, the idea of Jesus as gentle is revolutionary. It’s also deeply Scriptural. In Matthew 11, when Jesus describes himself, he calls himself “gentle and humble,” or in some translations, “gentle and lowly.” This narration comes immediately after he invites us to come to him and find rest for our souls, a phrase that hits me like cool water on a blistering day. Rest? For my soul? Yes, please.
“Be gentle with yourself. Be gentle with your kids. Be gentle with your congregation.”
There has been a great deal of tragedy in our church family this past month. Cancers returned, devastating accidents, lost jobs. In light of so much deep suffering, it can be easy to minimize the stress of our own more benign transitions. And indeed, picking up a few new ministry responsibilities pales in comparison to a health crisis. Starting a new school really can’t be compared to losing a job.
And yet, diminishing the reality of our own stressors does nothing for either those who suffer or for our own ache. Comparison isn’t just the thief of joy, it can be the death of a healthy prayer life. The Almighty does not compare our struggles to those of others, deeming us less worthy of attention, of answers, of gentleness.
Plus, when we are heard and feel held, we will often find renewed energy to extend care to our community too.
So, if you, like me, like so many of us, are facing transition this season, listen to Anna and those yellow warblers. Go gently now.
This, too, can be sweet.
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