The great Jesuit writer, Jean Pierre de Caussade, wrote of the sacrament of the present moment. Not regret of the past moment, nor anxiety for the future moment, but the sacrament, the holiness, the gift of this year, this season, this month, this week, this day, this right-now present moment of grace, of breath and awareness. I need to reflect often on this, to remember that every moment, the past and the future, too, holds God’s promises, his provision and his presence.

A few months ago, my husband and I attended a friend’s 50th birthday. We found ourselves among a large group of vibrant, warm-hearted people with whom we discovered many common connections. It was delightful. But the following day my husband said, “Do you realize we were the oldest ones there?”

His words stunned me. What? But, of course, we were! Most of the others were years younger, and all were involved in some kind of service or ministry. They were standing where I remember standing myself so recently, but now no longer. It was a sobering moment. There I was, a giant step away from the heart of the action, like being parked and forgotten on the outskirts of activity.

Seasons of Life

On reflection, though, I realized that this current season of life is one lived from the sidelines. I watch others do the kinds of ministry that I once did—and not so long ago. I hear parents relating to their children and it seems only yesterday that I faced similar delights and challenges with my own children.

Along with this being on the sidelines is the not knowing. Not knowing the new young officers coming out of training college, not knowing what or who or where. It’s a strange aspect of letting go, giving up control. It feels like emptiness, a slow dying, yet I am still fully alive. How to survive on the sidelines, how to bring an antidote to not knowing?

I call to mind Australian composer Major Howard Davies’ words: “Many are the things I cannot understand / All above me mystery I see” (SASB 876). So, I ask myself the usual questions: What is the particular gift of this season of life? What is the work that needs to be done here and now? How do I pray from this sidelined place, this place of unknowing? Maybe a list would help. What do I know for sure? With one hand tightly closed I hold the certainties of my faith. With the other hand open and receptive I carry the mystery of the things I do not yet understand.

Carry the Questions

I am reminded of a dear Barnabas encourager at one of our corps appointments, who told me one day, “The closer I get to heaven, the less certain I feel about my faith, and the more questions I have.” I wish I had known then the poet Rilke’s words: “Just carry the questions and one day you will live into the answers.”

Psalm 139 is reassuring with all its references to the God who knew me before I was born, who oversaw the knitting together of my bones in my mother’s womb, the weaving of sinew and shape and skin to make me who I uniquely am. In the midst of all the turmoil of my unknowing, I can find rest in God’s great all-encompassing knowing of the full span of my life.

Winter Season Offerings

Even in this sidelined season I have been given another place to stand where my passive role is to notice and observe and my active role is to encourage and bless. So how do I do that? More to the point, how am I doing that, making this present moment an opportunity to offer something sacred to those around me?

A snake sheds its skin, a growing crab breaks out of its confining shell. Both need a bigger skin or shell to grow into. This is a vulnerable time. The snake oozes with healing moisture, the crab scurries to find a bigger shell to bury itself in. It is, after all, a form of dying—the word “bury” seems appropriate.

Getting older feels to me not so much like finding a bigger “outer” but a smaller “outer” and a bigger “inner” space. Letting things grow within even as the exterior world diminishes. This is a delicate dance, both holding close and letting go.

Gather Up and Give Away

I read that an Archbishop of Canterbury, when he died, had his nightshirt as his final and only possession. Everything else had been given away. I love the completion of that gesture. A life well and fully lived, then graciously and generously concluded.

When all has been said and done, this season called generativity—guiding the next generation—is one to give away all that has been gathered, the treasures and the resources, as well as the wisdom learned over the years. To live each day to the full. To welcome it reverently, carry it prayerfully, then return it gratefully at the end. Then when this earthly life is over, to wrap up all the days with a huge ribbon that says, Thank you, thank you, thank you.

My soul rejoices and is glad in you; songs of gratitude fill my soul rising up to you, O Beloved. (Psalm 30, Psalms for Praying, by Nan Merrill).

Reprinted from WarCry (New Zealand, Fiji, Tonga and Samoa Territory).

Photo: Jacob Lund/stock.Adobe.com