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I’m living in my next normal.
This is what I now tell friends, my new expression for the time I am living in. You are welcome to share and use it too.
“Next normal” is intended to replace a linguistically faulty expression we’ve all been using the past two years, “the new normal.”
“New normal” no longer fits because how many “new normals” can we have?
Process theologians will remind you that “the now,” is always slipping to “the past.” The moment you declare anything “new” it no longer is.
As the great theologian, and Dallas boy, St. Steve of Miller, once sang:
“Time keeps on slipping, slipping, slipping … into the future…”
We cannot stop this slipping of time into the future. And if we cling too tightly to any one “now” moment, we eventually suffer and grieve as that moment decays and dies, as all present moments must.
Therefore, we are always headed to our “next normal,” because life itself is change.
The past two years brought so much change that you just want to get off the carnival ride for a moment. And the pace of change was already accelerating, even before the pandemic. But consider that our faith has already taught us that change is a part of our existence.
This month, Christians around the world will celebrate Easter. The message of Easter is that death comes out of life and that God has the final word.
But we don’t just hear this message in our pulpits. All around us, every spring, the world teaches us this lesson. Trees, grasses and flowers lose the grays and browns of winter and burst forth again, repeating an annual pattern and whispering this message of life from death.
Easter and spring, in their own ways, teach us that each new death leads us into “what comes next.”
The arch of our life’s journey, just like the arch of the seasons, is never a final “life into death.”
It’s always “life into death into life.”
“New life” will be a “next life,” not what has already happened. This is perhaps why Jesus tells Mary “don’t hold on to me” on Easter morning.
Holding on to what has happened is not what God calls us to do. Through Easter, God calls us to our “next life,” not our past life. Easter teaches that everything in life slips into “what comes next.”
Every “now” you experience is like your glorious and steamy morning shower. Eventually the hot water runs out, and the bliss ends, leaving you to suffer the cold water or get out and get on with your day.
There was never any “new normal” to find. Only a “next normal” to embrace.
God is always recreating your life. Resurrection is God’s message to us that the death of every “now” is never the end of our story.
I pray that you will be able to deeply trust this powerful truth, as God leads you to your “next normal.”
ERIC FOLKERTH is Senior Pastor at Kessler Park United Methodist Church. The Worship section is underwritten by Advocate Publishing and neighborhood businesses and churches listed. Call 214.560.4212 or email sales@advocatemag.com for advertising information.
