Have you ever wondered why we think our "resting" state should be stillness, rather than movement, flexibility or change? We have the interesting responsibility of translating a text that was written with the image of a flat, static world, into the language of movement. To do this, we must see movement as the "norm" — something that creates strength and life, rather than something that interrupts our being still.

When the poetry and hymns of the Psalms were being written, it made sense to the poet and to the people to speak of strength in the "roots of the mountains" and the spread of the blessings of God to the "ends of the earth." The ancients viewed the mountains as being "rooted" in the base of the universe below, and the distant edges, or ends, circumscribed the world. The inbreaking of God was viewed as making the mountains shake or smoke, not earthquakes or volcanoes. Today we know that some mountains are volcanic, some are created by the movements of the plates of the earth and some are remnants of a glacial past. Molten rock, water and other sorts of not very "solid" mass are at the base of the mountains. In fact, the mountains do move — at a pace too slow for us to observe. Still, we know that what keeps the universe together is not mass as much as it is motion — gravity from the rotation of the earth; energy from the cycling of the stars, suns and planets; positively and negatively charged ions in the atom. The whole system is actually moving.

What if we thought of our lives, our communities and our relationships that way? They are always growing and changing, even in small ways, so that they remain in relationship with each other. In fact, if our relationships didn't grow and change, the movements around us might fracture them.

Those of us who have moved from one community to another know this. For a while, you can continue to worship at the same church or go to the same doctors, hairdressers and restaurants, but pretty soon, you begin forming new relationships. It is too long a drive to run back and forth, or you can't depend on taking care of haircuts or doctors appointments when you return to visit. Relationships change. Some of us — clergy families, service personnel, staff members of large companies who are transferred from location to location — have learned to do this. Others of us wait until we are pushed to make the changes.

Would it make it easier if we thought of change as "normal?" If we recognized that our circle membership, unit membership or employment were more likely to change than to remain "still," would we plan for it? What would that planning look like? Families experience change through marriages, births, adoptions, divorces and deaths — even those relationships that we work hard at maintaining are subject to change. When the changes are small we can imagine that everything is holding constant. But once the dating son or daughter announces an engagement, or the new baby is born, or the loved one dies, the change is seismic.

by: Harriett Jane Olson who is deputy general secretary for the Women's Division. Article taken from January 2010 Response Magazine