"Endings" 12/26/10
Endings. Who doesn't like a perfect ending to a story?
Prince meets Prince and walks off into the sunset happy
forevermore. Princess meets Princess and walks off into the
sunset happy forevermore. Prince meets Princess and
walks off into the sunset happy forevermore. A good book
with just that perfect ending will keep our attention for hours
on end and then beg for a sequel. A play, an opera, a
movie with just the right ending will draw the attention of
crowds of people. But perfect endings are hot always what
happens in life. A life is cut short
by a tragic accident. The
lover of our life walks off into the sunset after too many angry
words. Our job comes to an end. That wonderful friendship
ends when we move or the other person moves. Life does
not always have perfect endings.
Gilda Radner once said:
"I wanted a perfect ending...
Now, I've learned the hard way that some poems
don't rhyme, and some stories don't have a clear
beginning, middle and end. Life is about not knowing,
having to change, taking the moment and
making the best of it,
without knowing what's
going to happen next.
Delicious ambiguity."
I have been thinking about endings a lot recently with
my retirement a little over a month away and I want to share
some thoughts with you tonight about endings. I have to
admit I don't particularly like endings. I'm not big on
what's going to happen next. I like what is stable pretty
much the same. That has some good points, but it also has
the negative side of not being open to change, letting the
status quo be the status quo, and keeping the door closed to
new possibility. So what do I know about endings?
1) Well no matter what happens in the end God is with
us. Whether we walk off into the
perfect sunset or are
washed a drift on beach. When I have faced endings in my
life; good or bad God has been there. Sometimes I've
blamed God for the ending, sometimes I've known this was
exactly the way something was suppose to end, and then
there have been those times Of ambiguity when I didn't know
what the heck was going on. But what I have always known
is that God is the ending and opening the door to a new
beginning. When it is a time of joy, I know that God is
walking right ahead of me into the future. When it is a time
of sadness, God is carrying me into the future. And when it is
a time of uncertainly, God is
sometimes nudging me into the
future. God is indeed the Alpha and Omega, the beginning
and the ending of our lives no matter what is happening.
2) The second thing I know about endings is that we
always live through them. When a relationship ends, we feel
the horrible pain and tearing loneliness that is part of that
ending. And for many days-into-days we feel like this is the
end, really the end of life as we have known it. But then
comes one day when we wake up and actually see the sun
in the sky again and a sliver of light slips through and we
have a ray of hope that we will get through this time and
move on. Even good endings are packed
full of emotion and
change. When we build a life with someone else there are
all sorts of adjustments that need to happen. Simple things
like where do we squeeze the toothpaste to more complex
things like how will we handle our financial matters. So
whether the ending is negative or positive we always live
through it and move on to experience what's on the other
side.
3) Every ending is a new beginning. Change is
inevitable whether we like it or not. The sun will come up
tomorrow and it will be a new day. The calendar will turn
over this Friday and it will be a new year. Some friends that
we thought we could never live without have been replaced
by new friends who bring exactly what's needed at this point in
our lives. That first lover who was the light of life has now
gone and our new lover is who we are meant to be with into
eternity. That job that filled so many wonderful hours of life
has now been replaced by a quieter time of reflection and a
different way of giving of ourselves. Every ending is a new
beginning filled with infinite possibilities of what is to be.
So as we come to the end of 2010 know
without a
doubt that God is in the beginning and the end and is on the
journey every moment in between. Nothing we have faced or
will face is too big for God. We will indeed wake up on
January 1, 2011 with God to guide us. Pray about the
endings in your life and be open to
God's new possibilities.
As a bit of mid-semester homework this is a great week
to put aside some time to do an inventory of the past year
and acknowledge any ways that you have made mistakes
over this past year. Learn from them, and move on. It is not
necessary and is is even harmful to take unnecessary guilt,
shame, resentments, anger into a new beginning. As you
reflect upon this past year celebrate the ways you have
grown and changed. When things change, when growth
happens new life is taking form, and God is born anew.
