Enjoy the Season You're In Now

Remember back when...?

In my early 20’s, I was a youth group leader at my Baptist church. The other youth minister, my friend Andy, and I led Bible studies and went to Christian concerts and hung out with the middle-schoolers and high-schoolers we mentored. We were full of energy and hope and possibility. It was a good time.

Yesterday, I attended the high school graduation party for Andy’s daughter. We’re in our 40’s now. At the party, I ran into Danielle, one of the kids from our youth group who is now in her late 30’s. We hadn’t seen each other in years, but we struck up a conversation just like it was the old days.

Only now, we are both older and have some life under our belts.

Danielle told me how she lost her way for a while. She was living with a guy for three years, partying, and her life had become a disaster. 

Eventually, she remembered who she truly is and returned to church. She has dated in the meantime, seeing guys she’s met at church and the gym and online. But she also said she’s happy being single. She has rediscovered her contentment in her relationship with God.

I told her about my marriage and divorce and my own struggles since we were both kids at our old church. I was no longer her “leader,” I was just a guy who has also discovered that the things of the world don’t satisfy.

As we talked, it occurred to me how we are not meant to stay the same people we were when we were in our youth. 

Those times were a gift from God.

But as Muhammad Ali said: “A man who views the world the same at fifty as he did at twenty has wasted thirty years of his life.” 

I’m glad Danielle and I are both doing well now. And I’m grateful for our time in the wilderness. God intends us to grow, but in this life, growth comes through struggle and pain and disappointment. That’s the price that must be paid to get where we need to be.

Outside on Andy’s patio, he barbecued potatoes and we talked about how far God has brought us since our days as youth leaders. He’s the pastor of a nondenominational church now, and I became Catholic years ago, but it doesn’t matter. 

We both know that life cuts across categories and we’re all just human, doing our best to seek God and live our best lives.

Andy told me he has made peace with getting older.

We’re no longer those wild-eyed youths jamming at Christian concerts and thumping Bibles. We’re not supposed to be. “I want to live in the season I’m in,” I told him. Andy smiled, his faint crow’s feet wrinkling around his eyes. “I do too,” he said. 

It reminded me of a Rich Mullins quote:

“At 18, no one knows as much as you. At 40, you begin to understand the wisdom of Solomon in his saying: 'Do not be overrighteous, neither be overwise—why destroy yourself? Do not be overwicked and do not be a fool—why die before your time? It is good to grasp the one and not let go of the other. The man who fears God will avoid all extremes’” (Ecclesiastes 7:16-18).

Sometimes we have to grieve our passing youth. But something better is on the horizon. 

Danielle wonders if she will ever get married and have children. I told her I got married again after my first marriage was annulled. I’m old enough to be a little wiser, more capable of loving well, and doing it better this time around. I wasn’t at 20. 

If we settle into the season we are in, then God can do amazing things if we cooperate with Him. 

It ain’t over until it’s over, and every morning we wake up is another opportunity to live our best life now. Not then. Ironically, if we accept where we are, I have found we grow more childlike and hopeful. As C. S Lewis said: “Some day you will be old enough to start reading fairy tales again.”

Let’s live out the fairy tale God has given each of us, whatever our age. 

And remember that the heroes of fairy tales have to go through some grim stuff before they get to happily ever after. Redemption usually doesn’t come until we have something to be redeemed from.

If you are younger, enjoy your youth. If you are older, take heart. Let’s not cling to a past we imagined is somehow better than where we are right now. This is true for dating, marriage, and the rest of life.

“Rejoice, O youth, while you are young and let your heart be glad in the days of your youth. Follow the ways of your heart, the vision of your eyes; Yet understand regarding all this that God will bring you to judgment. Banish misery from your heart and remove pain from your body, for youth and black hair are fleeting” (Ecclesiastes 11:9-10).

Youth is fleeting. But something better can take its place. With God, the best is always yet to come.