Fresh Starts

The end of August and the beginning of September is often a time of fresh starts for people.

A new school year at every level is just beginning.  

The season is about to change from summer to fall.

This is one of those waypoints during the year when it makes sense to stop and think about what you're doing in life, and why you're doing it.

This is also a time to take stock of your year so far.  

How are you doing with your New Year's resolutions?

How close are you to hitting your big goals for the year?

Christmas is coming.  Have you started making plans for the holidays yet?

I don't know if you are effected by any of these things, but this year I have been.

Over the last month, my family has embraced a turning point in our lives and we are in the middle of a fresh start.

    My son has begun high school.  Not just any high school.  He is at a boarding school.  This school year he will live more than 100 miles from my wife and I.

    

    In June I accepted the call to serve as the Minister of Mission Support at Good Shepherd Lutheran Church in Downers Grove, IL.  That means three weeks ago my family and I picked up and moved more than a hundred miles from the area we have called home most of our lives.

Fresh starts come in all different packages.  They enter our lives for many different reasons.   They can be frustrating at times (moving certainly is).  They can be heart-breaking at times.  It's tough to put distance between yourself and people you love.

But, fresh starts can also be highly rewarding.  Fresh starts open us up to new opportunities.  Often, they are the result of taking advantage of an opportunity.  They also put us into contact with a whole new world of people.  People we would have never known had we not exercised the courage to make a fresh start.

I don't know where you're at in life, but I do know that sometimes a fresh start is exaclty what the doctor ordered.  It gets us out of our familiar zone.  It puts us in contact with an entirely new community of people.  It can help us wake to the life we are supposed to be living.  Not settling for the one we have settled for.

I won't tell you what to do with your life.  That's your responsibility.  I would encourage you, though, especially if you are frustrated with your current situation, to think about a fresh start.  

Maybe that means moving.  Maybe that means changing where you work.  Maybe it means changing your career field all together.  However, I am not talking about scrapping your marriage.  You need to fix that if that's the source of your frustration.  A fresh start could mean distancing yourself from negative and destructive relationships in your life.  

You know you.  I don't know you, or your situation.  You know what it would mean to make a fresh start in your life.  I encourage you to take the leap.  A fresh start today could make all the difference in the rest of your life.

God bless.

Jason Fredrick