Change - the Price of Survival - Karen Toews

We recently purchased a piece of land and true to form, my husband had printed out house plans for my input before our signatures were barely dry. After 36 years of marriage, with eight different houses, we were able to agree on an initial draft with little grief or personal compromise. A week later while digging for the required soil test, my on-site contractor husband phoned me. They'd hit bedrock two feet down. Unless we were okay with living in an elevator-like structure, our plan needed to be changed.

Monday, April 19th I couldn't resist watching the Boston Marathon. Recognizing landmarks of the final mile through Commonwealth Avenue and Boylston Street, I could imagine how runners felt, battling through fatigue to the finish line. Two years ago we were positioned on Heartbreak Hill cheering on a friend as he conquered that challenging course. Nine years ago I ran it myself, euphoric with relief and the reward of feeling totally spent. My heart and mind would love to repeat this accomplishment but the physical realities of age with niggling injuries will probably prevent that from happening. I've had to change my running game.

I'm Alberta-born and raised: my prairie soul is imprinted with dark loam, wide skies and vacations in the Rockies. Three years ago, we made a cross-country move to the Maritimes. Two kids and six grandchildren living in Ontario and Maine influenced that decision - shared by our desire for adventure and a sense of God's leading. Everything was new: community, jobs/careers, east coast culture, church. We felt God's direction for us to belong to a fellowship of a denomination different than the one we'd been members of for our entire lives. This is a wonderful, growing experience, learning and appreciating creeds and prayers and readings - a change in our previous ideas about faith as experienced by other believers.

Often we aren't given a choice about change; sometimes we do have an option. Like my daughter-in-law who significantly changed my grandson's diet, which has resulted in remarkable improvements to his health and development. Or how consistent physio exercises are gradually changing my glut muscles to release pressure on my sacroilliac joint - a half marathon might be in my future, after all!

The call for change is one that keeps my life moving forward - whether I welcome it or it backs me into a corner, I have to decide how I'm going to handle it. And the only way for me to survive change, is to embrace the One who never changes.

"I the Lord do not change..." Malachi 3:6a (NIV)

Karen Toews
http://www.toewsontherun.com