Going Back to School Brings a New Season

BY JULIE FULLER

Back to school. Those three words evoke mixed emotions among students, parents and school staff. Summer has flown by; at least, it has for me and my two sons. As my boys get older and more involved with friends and extracurricular activities, time goes by faster than I can comprehend.

Back to school means back to a routine, with bedtimes and the morning rush to dash out the door. Back to school also means teachers and school staff are hard at work implementing rules and regulations and creating daily routines for the school day.

on July 13.

Happy birthday to our wonderful mother and grandma! We love you!

for new beginnings!

Back to school, for many of us, marks the beginning of a new season of football, marching band and other fall sports. Or it could mark a new season of life for some, as this might be the first year they don’t have to get a student off to school or the first year they do have a student in school.

Going back to school also can offer us a new season in our spiritual lives, a time for us to shift our focus. I believe in seeing our lives as being made up of seasons. Some seasons are longer than others; some seasons are harder than others; but no season lasts forever. Ecclesiastes 3:1 says, “There is a time for everything and a season for every activity under the heavens.” As we journey through this new month of going back to school, can we begin to see this as a new season of learning and growing closer to Jesus?

I recently experienced a season of feeling overwhelmed and stressed beyond what I typically feel on a regular basis. It was in that brief time that I had to shift my priorities and my focus. I was concentrating on everything and everyone who was causing stress in my life and not on the one who is the Prince of Peace. As I began to refocus my thoughts on God and giving the Holy Spirit the space to work in me, my stress and overwhelming thoughts were replaced with thanksgiving. God used those situations that I was stressed and anxious about to demonstrate the work of the Holy Spirit, empowering me to face them and to feel the peace that passes all understanding. However you experience the time to go back to school, may we all use this as a season to focus our lives on Jesus.