Reimagining

We've had some time over these past few days to sit and think. To pray. To reflect. 

There isn't a prescribed way to grieve. There's no predictor of the things that come to mind or how to process through them. We just take it all as it comes, sorting along the way. 

Ryan and I have always been planners and dreamers. It's in both our natures, and we love spending our time imagining what's to come. The sudden changes have been jarring reminders that we can dream all we want, but we have no guarantees of the outcome.

The sudden changes have also been convicting reminders to live well. To live fully. To make the most of the moments we have together. To make the most of the words we speak.

Sometimes we have to reimagine life in ways we never expected. Ryan mentioned to me yesterday that he never imagined he would have lost both his mom and Allen at the same age that my parents were when I was born to to them. (Another event that caused the reimagination of life in unexpected ways...but I digress.) 

But sometimes reimagining life in ways we never expected can be a beautiful thing. It can be a chance to pause. To think through the things that matter most. To let go of things that have cluttered the way. To grab hold of things that matter most. To make fresh commitments to the things God has asked.

Reimagining is not reinventing. I have become less and less of a fan of the term reinvent as I've gotten older. Maybe to me it just feels like a recipe for failure. Reinventing feels like an attempt to control by forcing life and circumstances to go the way I want them to go. It feels a bit like a show. A facade, even.

But reimagining feels to me like taking hold of what you have in front of you and daring to believe that God can saturate it. That He can take what others meant for evil and use it for something good instead. That He can restore what the locusts have eaten. That he can take ashes and strife and make something beautiful. (Yes, I know that is mixing Scripture and Gaither lyrics all in the same paragraph.) 

But as we stand in our grief, I'm grateful for a God who pushes us to reimagine. This is not what we would have imagined (or chosen) for our lives. These last two years surprised us in hard ways. But God is present and active. He can teach us to reimagine the days ahead without forgetting the legacy left behind. 

May we honor those legacies by reimagining well.