Real Women...Real Stories

Jenni Roney

TRANSITIONS

Dear Diary,

We are now living in Switzerland for Doug's one-year work assignment. Ever since we got the three-weeks warning that we were moving overseas, countless people have told me what a great opportunity this is. They all said, "This is the perfect time in your life to go" and "What a wonderful experience" and "I have always wanted to live abroad." Well, I haven't! I like the familiar. Unfortunately, my life has been one big transition lately. I quit my full-time job to become a full-time mother; gave birth to our first baby; left my lifelong home and entire extended family; moved from Kansas To Minnesota at ten days postpartum; traded my closely-connected small town for an anonymous big city; plus my husband finished his college career with two bachelors degrees and started his first real job. All of that happened over a span of two weeks-just five months ago. And just when we were starting to get settled, this new "opportunity" came along.

Let me tell you about my experience in Switzerland so far. I spend each day in my 1970's-orange-and-avocado-decorated townhouse with only my five-month-old baby to talk to. I have two TV channels that I can understand-CNN and BBC. The grocery store frightens me. I can't speak the language or read the labels; everything is four times more expensive than in America; I am still figuring out the foreign currency; and the butcher sells jackrabbit and horsemeat. There is cigarette smoke in almost all public places; I can't understand the German loudspeaker to know when to get off the train; and it is so cloudy I can't even see the mountains. However, I did find my first can of Dr. Pepper today and happily paid five times what it would have cost in America. I guess there is some good left in my world.

Sounds pretty bleak, doesn't it? In the midst of a transition, the cloud of grief can blind us to the beauty and blessings that are all around us. Months later, I was seeing things more clearly. I had discovered Swiss chocolate, bread and pastries. We had traveled to Italy, France, and Germany and enjoyed four weeks more vacation than the company offered in The States. We didn't have to pay income tax, Doug became fluent in German, and our challenging circumstances brought us closer to God than ever before. Plus, I realized that my loving Heavenly Father had known in advance how much I would need a friend to fill the long days in that lonely townhouse. In His perfect timing, He sent me a precious little boy who would love me unconditionally and bring me unparalleled joy in the midst of a stressful transition.

Those two moves were just the beginning for us. Over the course of nine years, we moved eight times; had three boys within four of those same years; and lived in a total of five states, seven cities, and one foreign country. During all of those transitions, I found a lot of encouragement in Susan Miller's book, After the Boxes are Unpacked. Susan talks about three necessary steps we must take in order to heal during transitions. She says we must "let go, start over, and move ahead." And as we do that, she says that God will do three things as well. He will "mend, mold, and mature us." Here is a great quote that she included in her book from Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland:

"I-I hardly know, Sir, just at present," Alice repeated rather shyly. At least I know who I was when I got up this morning, but I think I must have been changed several times since then."

Sound familiar? Our lives are constantly changing. And as Alice experienced, transitions usually involve a change in our perceived identity. We used to be one person, now we seem to be another. But behind all of those changes is a great God with a great purpose. If we will trust the Lord to develop us according to His sovereign plan, he will gradually transform us into the likeness of Christ. In Philippians 1:6, Paul says that he is "confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus."

I was once a slimy little larva who didn't see the need for metamorphosis. But God knew that without transitions I would never develop wings. Once we unfurl our colored wings and fly, we will look down and give thanks that we aren't still crawling around in the mud.