Read: Ecclesiastes 3:1-15
For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven…. (Ecclesiastes 3:1, NRSV).
“How did you decide it was time to retire?”
This was the question posed to me by an old friend who was wrestling with her own decision about when to retire from teaching. She followed the question with a statement that further illuminated her quandary. “Every time I start thinking about it, a student comes up to me and tells me that one of my courses changed their life.”
Praise God for such courses and such comments! But I’m pretty sure they shouldn’t be the deciding factor in the question of when it’s time to retire. So, I said to my friend, “If you wait until those comments stop coming, it either will mean that A) You waited too long, or B) You’ll never retire.”
That’s part of why I have decided to retire—both from teaching (34 years total) and from writing this blog (almost 5 years). June 30 will be my last day of full-time teaching at Western Theological Seminary in Holland, Michigan. Today will be the last day of writing these little Bible studies.
I have enjoyed this “business that God has given [me] to by busy with” (v. 10). I know that I have been exceptionally blessed to do what I love for a living. But I refuse to fall for the myth of my own indispensability. Besides, there are new challenges that I’m looking forward to in this new season. You may even see the results of the new projects that God has given me to be busy with. We’ll see. All I know is that there is a season for everything, and a time for every matter under heaven.
Thank you for walking with me during seasons past. May God bless you as you discern your own times and seasons.
Ponder: What feeds your own myth of indispensability? What’s up with that?
Pray: Walk with us through every season of our lives, gracious God.