In Between This Instant!

Maybe a burger doesn’t mind the bun. Maybe Oreo stuffing is at peace with the cookies. Maybe water is happy to be not steam or ice. But for the rest of us, being in between is no desired destination.

We get the false idea from an early age that life takes us from one stage to the next with zero in-between time. After going from first to second grade, fifth to sixth, middle to high school … you begin to think that as long as time passes, you are moved to the next level in life just as naturally as breathing. Going from one thing to another should be smooth, easy. No one ever talks about in-between time.

But then comes real life. And that’s when we realize that in-between time is all the time. We face it in pesky, everyday sorts of ways: standing in line at Target. Stuck in traffic. Listening to cheesy hold music while on the phone with the dentist. Standing in front of the microwave. At gate C9 in the airport.

We also face in-between time on monumental levels: when we’re pregnant. After we’ve been laid off. When we receive a diagnosis but no cure. On a friend’s couch with all our belongings in the car. After he moves out and before the divorce papers are served.

In-between time is brutal. It’s relentless. And it’s not going away.

Are you experiencing in-between time right now? How are you responding? Are you floundering, anxious, and impatient? Or, have you perhaps come to terms with this third point in time that has wedged itself in between Point A and Point B? What if you could embrace your in-between time as a monkey swings from one branch to another? In faith. With determination. In eager expectation. And perhaps even with grace and style.

“I wait for the LORD, my whole being waits, and in his word I put my hope.” Psalm 130:5

“Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer.” Romans 12:12