{"id":633,"date":"2017-03-09T20:21:07","date_gmt":"2017-03-09T20:21:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/new.brethren.org\/messenger\/?p=633"},"modified":"2018-09-21T20:23:14","modified_gmt":"2018-09-21T20:23:14","slug":"caterpillar-soup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/potluck\/caterpillar-soup\/","title":{"rendered":"Caterpillar soup"},"content":{"rendered":"

All things new! Sure beats the alternative: stale, repetitive life.<\/strong><\/p>\n

But newness is not instantaneous. It depends on endings. And so a question: Have you ended anything? For the most part, we view endings as bad. But endings are just a natural part of the rhythm of life. We don\u2019t comprehend the normalcy of endings, because endings necessitate loss, and loss stinks.<\/p>\n

So we resist endings. But remember, you can\u2019t get newness without loss. Vital life is dependent on releasing some aspect of what we\u2019ve always known. Jesus teaches this: \u201cListen carefully: Unless a grain of wheat is buried in the ground, dead to the world, it is never any more than a grain of wheat\u201d (John 12:24,\u00a0The Message<\/em>).<\/p>\n

So too for our lives. Unless we are willing to become \u201cdead to the world,\u201d entering into necessary endings, we never advance.<\/p>\n

A few years ago,\u00a0Scientific American<\/em>\u00a0described the developmental process of a caterpillar becoming a butterfly. Most of us fixate on the outcome: the butterfly. But a butterfly would never emerge if the caterpillar were not willing to \u201cdie to self,\u201d disintegrating into a protein-rich soup\u2014caterpillar soup\u2014that fuels \u201cthe rapid cell division required to form the . . . features of an adult butterfly or moth.\u201d<\/p>\n

A glorious butterfly occurs only if disintegration happens, if caterpillar soup is allowed to take place. In like manner, glorious life does not occur for us unless disintegration happens, as we allow life to \u201cget soupy\u201d on occasion.<\/p>\n

Where does life need to get soupy for you? Where do endings need to occur?<\/p>\n

Last summer, my son married. This was a much-anticipated wedding, and you would think this new beginning would be a season of pure and unadulterated joy. Largely, it was. But ramping up to the wedding day, I also experienced a fair measure of grief mingled with my joy. Peter and I had been close for years, and I feared things would now be different.<\/p>\n

I stewed about this right up to the wedding. Before walking out with him to begin the ceremony, I could contain my fear no longer. Turning to Peter, literally right before we processed, I blurted out, \u201cYou\u2019ll still call me, won\u2019t you? We\u2019ll still be close?\u201d<\/p>\n

He assured me, \u201cOf course, Dad!\u201d<\/p>\n

We proceeded on, and now beyond, with my amped anxiety for naught; I not only gained a cherished daughter, I gained a reshaped, more differentiated son.<\/p>\n

There are understandable reasons why we avoid the \u201csoup\u201d of life. But if we\u2019re attentive, we\u2019ll awaken to a counterintuitive discovery that endings and loss can result, in God\u2019s time, in a reshaped reality\u2014which is good.<\/p>\n

On occasion, God times confirmation of his goodness in the near term; your son turns and says, \u201cOf course, Dad.\u201d But more often, God times the confirmation of his goodness in the far term, requiring patience, perseverance, and trust.<\/p>\n

In between, hard honesty is required, as we trust God for goodness. But acknowledge that it\u2019s a process, requiring \u201ccaterpillar soup\u201d and the necessity of living with some gooeyness for a season. From the gooeyness, God\u00a0does<\/em>\u00a0promise goodness, if we just give God some time\u2014the time of our life.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Where does life need to get soupy for you?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":634,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[114,50],"class_list":["post-633","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-potluck","tag-paul-mundey","tag-potluck"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/633","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=633"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/633\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":635,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/633\/revisions\/635"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/634"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=633"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=633"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=633"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}