SETTLING

PRACTICE: What place in your life have you settled but know that it can’t be the destination?

During my meditation time recently, the leader centered his thoughts around “setting out and settling.” I listened intently to scripture, the commentary and prayed the closing prayer but the notion of “setting out and settling” would not leave me – so much so that I shared the phrase with my work team during our Monday Morning Motivation Moment.

After struggling with the thought for a day or so, these self- examination questions bubble to the surface: Were there times in my journey where I set out but somewhere along the way stopped pushing forward toward the promised goal? Were there places in my life where I settled for a bit and when I tried to move forward, circumstances kept saying, “not yet?” The answer to both questions is, “absolutely.” Due to space limitations, I can share only one example in hopes that it will further your thought process about you.

The downsizing of my long- time employer 7 years ago forced me to SET OUT on a new path with a new company. I began that journey believing that it would be a short trip. Every year after the first, I contemplated the next year as being last. Every year something or someone clearly demonstrated “not yet.” All along the way I pondered my next step, SETTLED in for a bit, and pondered again what I would do if I didn’t work full time. At the end of 2019, I had the grand plan for SETTING OUT to my next place…work 18 more months and call it quits. Then the world turned upside down and I questioned the decision.

I will leave full time employment as I know it at the end of the year with blessings beyond what I could have ever imagined. In hindsight, all the “not yets” were the preparation for the great blessing to come.

This is easy to see now. It was not so easy to see in 2016 or 2018 or when the chaos of work was making my skin crawl.

I think it is a difficult task to know when one has settled, when one should move on, or even when one has reached the destination. I don’t have a formula to help figure out the answers. What I do know is the answer will come. The answer most likely will not look like what you envisioned and the “not yet” places are just as fruitful and important as the final destination.

Gen 11:31

PONDER THIS THOUGHT – Comfort has the potential to keep me settled and hinder my setting out.