Remember that Wednesday night when you found out that professional basketball was canceled, that disease you heard about on the news was now considered a pandemic, and Tom Hanks was fighting this now not-so-distant disease?
Remember the days following when kids got sent home from school, companies started telling their employees to work from home, movie theaters, churches, restaurants, and most of the world shut down?
Remember when grocery stores became a place of survival of the fittest?
The world changed that Wednesday night, probably forever.
Life-Changing Events
But, do you remember waking up that Wednesday morning or what you did on the Tuesday before chaos abounded?
In some ways it feels like there should be a warning signal to us that, “Hey! By the way the world as you know it is going to change later today. Better have your life in-order.”
But, that’s not how most life-changing events happen. We carry on with our lives as usual until, bam! The life-changing event hits us and forever we are marked by pre-event and post-event.
For instance…
- we have pre 9/11 and post 9/11
- we have B.C. aka Before Christ and A.D. aka Anno Domini (the year of our Lord/birth of Jesus Christ)
- for me, I have life before illness and life post-diagnosis
- we have pre-Columbine and post-Columbine
- now we will forever have life before COVID and life after COVID
In all of these instances, most of us didn’t know waking up that morning that the world would be marked by that day.
We just woke up and carried on our day as usual, until our usual wasn’t capable of being normal anymore.
The Week Before
If you could relive the week leading up to that Wednesday night in March would you do anything differently?
What I did during the days leading up to Wednesday night I can’t recall, but let’s be honest it was most likely a lot of doctor’s appointments. However, how I spent that Wednesday night I remember exactly what I was doing.
Thinking back I remember I went to hang out with the youth group kids that night, but I almost didn’t because I was so tired.
Little did I know that when I walked out of the church that night it would be the last time I would be around that many people/ around my people, and the last time I would physically be in my church for 5 months and counting.
Maybe it was the last time that I would ever feel “safe” around that many people?
Youth Group
I’ve been hanging with the same group of middle school girls on Wednesday nights for the last couple of years.
I love my girls, but sometimes, okay most of the time, I’m left scratching my head by the end of the night wondering how we got from Jesus to Jake Paul.
But, not our last Wednesday together.
These girls came in filled with deep questions and genuine curiosity. Both the other leader and I looked at each other several times amazed at their eagerness and openness to learn more.
We spent our normal amount of time together and I could tell for some of them they were so close to diving in.
Little did we know that outside our classroom the world was being sent into chaos over a worldwide pandemic, but mostly panicking over the NBA suspending their season.
Kidding…kind of…
When the time was up for the night before we all headed home to be abruptly bombarded with a scary new reality I was so energized to continue our talk the following week.
That was actually how we ended the night, assuring them that next week we would continue our conversation.
Next Wednesday Isn’t Guaranteed
19 Wednesdays later we still haven’t had the opportunity to continue our conversation.
If I could relive the week before chaos night I would press into one thing.
I wouldn’t have worried about stocking up on toilet paper or Clorox wipes, although it would’ve been a good investment.
Doctor’s appointments, well, trust me they would wait for me.
Going out to my favorite restaurant would’ve been cool, but 2 weeks into the chaos I would want it again.
They released all the movies to On-Demand, so no need to rush to a movie theater.
But, that Wednesday night, as chaos unknowingly abounded outside our classroom I would’ve finished our conversation.
No Regrets
Now, I don’t believe in regrets, and I most certainly do believe that everything happens for a reason.
Matter of fact, I’ve talked to some of my girls in the past few months and I’m proud of the work they’re doing individually to learn more of who God is to them.
I’ve watched some of them open up their Bibles for the first time on their own and I’m just as energized now as I was on that Wednesday night to see how God reveals Himself to them and through them in the days ahead.
So, I’m not going to regret that night, but use it as a reminder that some conversations need my full attention.
I want that Wednesday chaos abounded to be my lesson learned that we are not guaranteed next Wednesday.
Are there any conversations in your life that need your full attention? Is there an unsaid or unfinished conversation in your life that you would be disappointed if you were never able to finish?
If so, give it all your attention until you feel it is finished.
“Come now, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit’— yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.”
James 4:13-15
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