Moments of transition in our lives and relationships can be really scary. They can be really sacred too.
This short episode of The BETWEEN Podcast features host Matt Mattson offering some thoughts on this season of transition, and the transitions in our lives. This episode also serves as the official conclusion of Season 1 of the show (don't worrry... we're already working on Season 2!)
As always, listen to our show wherever you listen to podcasts, or just visit our website: https://between.church/podcast
Thanks to everyone for their support with this first season of the show! We're so grateful for the sacred connections we share with you.
Hey there friend! Welcome to another episode of The BETWEEN Podcast. This is just a short little episode....
I wonder who discovered pumpkin spice.
I wonder if they're getting their due. I wonder if there's a person just sitting on an orange throne in a pumpkin spice mansion and just sipping on an $8 dollar latte all day long...
The fall is great. The autumn is awesome.
As I'm recording this episode, we're in the time of transition... Halloween decor is showing up at all the stores, coffee shops become seasonal drug dealers, feeding the pumpkin spice addictions of women in camel colored and burgundy hued outfits... and fall is almost here.
Here's my hot take for the fall. I don't like Pumpkin Spice. But I do like candy corns. Those little yummy corn syrup or honey constructed candies.... which I can easily fit 20 of in my mouth at a time. Oh, and the little marshmallow creme pumpkins too... I love those. And I love fall beers... Oktoberfests and marzens... this season of change... this season of transition is pretty great. There's something for everyone.
And, it has me thinking about transition. It has me thinking about those moments when we feel the seasons turning over in our lives...
Have you ever shared a moment with someone... and in that moment you just knew that things were changing? You could sense the newness and the discomfort... the peculiar sensation that things that were... simply are no longer...
Maybe your child suddenly looked or sounded different to your loving parental gaze.
Maybe you noticed a parent seemed older in a way that you just didn't expect to happen so quickly.
Maybe an old friend seemed distant and different... you couldn't put your finger on it exactly... but they were becoming a new version of them now.
Those moments can be sacred. They can be scary too... but they can be sacred.
Holy transition moments.
Blessed bridge moments.
If our eyes and hearts and souls are open in those moments, we can appreciate them for what they are. We can capture them in our spiritual memories and hold onto them forever. Knowing, as we've always known deep down, that things are meant to change. Things are meant to evolve. Things are meant to resurrect in new ways.
I've got two little quotations I want to share with you, if you'll allow me...
There's this book of blessings I have on my desk titled, "To Bless The Space Between Us" by John O'Donohue. Now... if that's not a book with a title that is relevant to our growing global faith community called... BETWEEEN... I don't know what is. "To Bless The Space Between Us." Anyway, somewhere in that book, buried inside of of the many beautiful blessings that it continues... is this tiny little passage:
"Always have the courage
To change, welcoming those voices
That call you beyond yourself"
I love the idea of welcoming the voices that call us beyond ourselves. I've found that sometimes those voices come in the form of people in our lives who are changing, who are growing, and who are evolving... and they show up in front of us as an example of how we're supposed to do the same thing. How we're supposed to have the courage to change too.
Oh, and I wanted to share one other quote with you... this is from one of my favorite faith-related authors and artists... Scott Erickson, who is also known as Scott The Painter on social media... I have one of his prints hanging in my office... the image is of a silhouette of a person... and instead of a head, the person has a lit match... the hair looks like the flame of the match.
Beneath the image there's a quote that reads like this...
"Grant me the wisdom
to know when to light the way forward
or to burn the whole thing down.
May my light be a gift to others either way."
In times of change and transition... in our lives and in our relationships... we often have to be the light because the way ahead is darker than the path we've been following... that old path was illuminated by the wisdom of time but the new way forward requires us to shine something ahead from deep within.
There's this passage from Isiah that I think speaks to these moments of sacred transition in our lives...
"I will lead the blind by ways they have not known, along unfamiliar paths I will guide them; I will turn the darkness into light before them and make the rough places smooth. These are the things I will do; I will not forsake them."
That's God promising us that when the way ahead looks dark, but we hear a voice calling us beyond ourselves... a voice calling us beyond the things that we've known and been sure of... to not fear... to have faith in what might be ahead... to know that the rough places we feel in this moment of change will eventually be smoothed.
I've been thinking a lot about people in my life who are experiencing big moments of life transition right now... friends who have just had babies, parents whose babies just went off to college for the first time, older adults who are being confronted with the realities of aging... little kids who are encountering the challenges and transitions and changes of growing up in new and frightening ways.
I've been thinking about how seasons change. I've been thinking about these moments when we know our relationships, our friendships, and our identities are in a moment of transition.
These moments are sacred. And talking about them with others is one of the holiest and most spiritually satisfying things we can do. Especially when we find people who know the turmoil and possibility that comes along with change.
As the summer turns to fall, sip a pumpkin spice something... chew on some candy corns... toast someone with an Oktoberfest bier... and ask them what season of their life they might feel changing alongside the golden leaves on the trees. Share with them some of the transition turmoil you've been feeling. Light the way forward for each other.
And that brings me to my final point... this is a transition moment for this podcast. Nothing dramatic... just the official end of season one. We'll get started on season two almost immediately. But I wanted to take a moment to really express my gratitude to everyone who has listened, who has given us a 5 star review, who has shared this podcast with their friends... and I want to give a huge thank you to all of the phenomenal guests we've had on the show this year. I mean... I couldn't have possibly imagined the level of sacred conversations we've had. Just amazing guests. I'm so so grateful and I've learned so much from them all.
OK... hey, before you go, please don't forget to sign up for our Substack, go to our website and subscribe to our main email list, subscribe to our YouTube channel, follow us on social media, start a BETWEEN Group in your local community... and find whatever way makes sense to be a part of our global, inclusive, growing faith community that is entirely focused on helping you create more moments of sacred human connection in the space between you and every person you encounter in your life.
My favorite church is the space BETWEEN people.... now go, with God's love and create the church BETWEEN.
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