The Great Disruption

It is 11:30 on Friday night. In six and a half hours a good
friend from Seattle, a fellow PhD student, will pick me up,
make me breakfast, and take me to the station to catch the
7:48 train going south. In a little more than two hours later,
I'll be at Holy Island/Lindisfarne. I'll write about what I will
be doing there in the weeks to come.

But right now I'm staring into the face of a great disruption.
I spent most of the day saying my goodbyes to a lot of people.
Most of the goodbyes were short and sweet, but there were
a few that I lingered to chat, putting off a little bit longer the
final packing. I just spent the last few hours packing and put-
ting most of my stuff in storage. So, I'll have stuff in both St.
Andrews and Holy Island.

To say goodbye to people I've cared about, to put my stuff in
storage, and to make a leap into the unknown of living in a new
and different place-all of that makes me feel overwhelmed
with a wave of disruption. I feel like I'm in a free fall and that
at any moment now I will lose it all.

That's when the words of David that I read early this morn-
ing come back to me: "Be strong, and let your heart take
courage, all you who wait for the Lord!" (Ps. 31:24). I take
comfort in those words.

Blessings to you and yours,