Reassigned.

I remember when I was a Sophomore in High School adjusting to the school district having reassigned high school students from Victory to Franklin High School. I had gone to Victory from fifth grade through ninth grade and had such great friends there and then the districts merged and we had to go by bus 25 miles each way because there was a bridge out along the way. 50 miles each day on the bus with friends from my old school and then thrust into the mix of students from Franklin High School. It wasn’t my choice. I was reassigned.

Then in the middle of my Junior year of High School after only being there for a year and a half my Dad was reassigned from one church he pastored to another, from a village to a town. We only moved a half dozen miles or so but it was a different school district, Grove City, and once again I was displaced. It was my third high school and I was with people I didn’t know at all. It wasn’t my choice. I had been reassigned schools because my Dad was reassigned jobs.

In the middle of the year, I had to adjust. I really had no choice but to make the best of it and so I tried to fit in. Fortunately, there were some really kind people at that school who took me in and befriended me as I befriended them. Many of them had been in school together since they were just young children. They knew each other well but some of them, that’s all I needed, some of them were the kindest and the best people to me. I had had such good friends before in my other schools and fortunately, I found some more friends in this new place.

I survived and even thrived in this new school with a new band to play trumpet in, a chorus to sing in, and friends who took a chance on befriending the new guy. I look back on those days with fondness and am so thankful that a time in my life that could have been so lonely, wasn’t.

Perhaps times of change like that when my Dad was reassigned or my school was reassigned prepared me for the life I have lived. Looking back I have been through a lot of changes, lived a lot of places, packed and unpacked a lot of boxes, and experienced both heartache and joy. Now it’s time once again. Reassigned. Following where God sends. Where God leads me I will follow. 

It’s good you know to go when God says go. I’m in no way perfect and so many times in my life I have done less than my best, less than what I knew and know God wanted and wants. But still, I go. Once again. 

Reassigned.