My eyes are struggling to focus on these words on my computer monitor even as I type them. It has only been one week since I picked up my new glasses with progressive lenses from my optometrist. She told me it would take two weeks for my eyes to adjust to having different areas of the lens to look through for distance, intermediate, and close-up vision. The intermediate part of the lens is supposed to be specifically for computer work, at least when my eyes have adjusted. But, it doesn’t seem to be working today. So, I wonder if I should continue to use the new glasses. I must use them in order for my eyes to adjust. But, I also need to see these words on the monitor clearly, for which my old single lens glasses work better. This change is frustrating and time-consuming for me, and is likely to result in a headache.

As I write this, we do not yet know who will be the new president of the Philippines. We do not even know if one will be proclaimed, accepted, and inaugurated by June 30. But we know that the government will continue to make changes that will impact our lives. On my calendar for next week is a trip to the immigration office simply because of an administrative change they are making to stop using only paper for alien registration but to begin using smart cards, whatever those are. All wonder what changes the new government may bring to the economy and many other areas of our lives.

Change, whether personal, in government, or in society, is inevitable. But that has always been true. It has been said that the only thing that doesn’t change is the truth that “Things always change”. Fortunately, part of the good news of scripture is that God uses change to help us grow to become more like Him. Here are six examples of how God used change in the lives of his people.

Relate like Ruth. Ruth was widowed at a young age, left childless, and then moved to another country with her mother-in-law where they had no property, business, or close family able to support them. None of us would like to experience such changes. Yet Ruth related so well to her mother-in-law that her mother-in-law’s friends considered her better than seven sons!³ Are you struggling with people from a different sub-culture or another culture? Follow Ruth’s example and make at least one good friend from that group. Ruth is a great example of love that featured openness, involvement, appropriate initiative, fellowship, and accountability.

Enjoy like Jeremiah. Jeremiah seemed to have little to enjoy as he watched his people refuse to change their allegiance back to God and then experience a brutal invasion from a heartless army. But, he wrote a letter in Chapter 29 to the exiles whom that army captured and relocated. In that letter he wrote that they should settle down after the changes and to enjoy the ordinary things God will bring. Surely if such exiles can enjoy God’s blessings in the midst of such changes, perhaps we also can learn to see the humor and joy in change.

Depend like David. Which of us would want to be like David? Having been called by God and anointed as king, King Saul stole years of David’s life by forcing him to flee to the wilderness in order to save his life. These changes forced him to miss family, leave the family agricultural business, and endure much hardship. He hated the changes, including missing the water of his hometown.⁵ But, these changes were a necessary part of his training to be a good king. What did he learn from God? He learned that he could depend on God, or, as the Bible put it, “find strength in the Lord.”⁶) David’s faith in the midst of desperate changes in his life continues to inspire us.

So, I am trying to learn from the Lord what he wants me to learn from the changes in my eyes, change in the government, and changes in society. Changes are not to be dreaded. Change can be a tool that God can use to make you more like him. I have arranged the six paragraphs preceding this one to spell out E-DREAD. Let us let the first ‘E’ stand for ‘End’: E (end) the DREAD of change by Enduring liking Nehemiah, Detecting like Daniel, Relating like Ruth, Enjoying like Jeremiah, Accepting like the Apostle Paul, and Depending like David. God doesn’t change. But, He wants to use change to change us to be like Him.

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