At this stage of life, we have a lot of memories to catalog and keep up with. I laugh and tell friends it’s not your memory that’s getting tired, it’s that we have so much to remember – so many events, so many faces, so many moves, so many relationships. As a married couple we have lived in 20 different houses in 7 different places, including a year in Africa. It’s hard to keep up with friends and colleagues when life has been so diverse and explosive.
On the flip side of many changes, retirement brings some consistency to life. As we leave the work force, we usually make decisions that we believe will last for the rest of our life – stay in our home or a move close to family, a last home on the water or the golf course, a move to warmer weather. Once that major decision is made, retirees usually settle in to their “end of life” routines and rarely move (unless health reasons demand a final move).
While our physical setting brings a day in and day out steadiness to our days, God never tells us to stop moving in our spiritual life. We may take up new hobbies, learn a new skill, plan trips to places we’ve never been before, but those choices don’t keep us away from having room for God’s transformation in us. We can even be settled in and cozy in our homes, living the life we had hoped, but still be incredibly active in the process of sanctification, which doesn’t end until life ends.
Take your cues from God’s Word – Sarah had the surprise of her life when she had Isaac at a startling age beyond childbirth years. Talk about a transformation! Abraham was still being transformed into the great man of faith he was as God led him up in the mountains to sacrifice his only son. Paul never stopped preaching the gospel, even when he spent his last days in a Roman jail. John wrote the book of Revelation in his later years on the island of Patmos. There is nothing in his word that indicates we stop moving for the Lord in our golden years. God has work for us to do!
We’ll discuss lots of ways to use our retirement in other posts, but it all begins by embracing spiritual transformation as the foundation of all God will ask us to do. If He has work for us to do, He has some coaching to do in us, as well. He wants our eyes on His Word, He wants our hearts captured for prayer, He wants continued conversation with us, and He wants us to KEEP GROWING. We can’t let ourselves fall prey to the deception that it’s time to focus only on rest and relaxation when there is so much kingdom work to do. And we need to be prepared for the challenges ahead.
Do a spiritual inventory as you move into retirement. Have you realized that now you have more time to devote to serving God and growing in your faith – or are you excusing yourself from Bible Study because you have already studied every book in the Bible? Dive in on your own and ask the Holy Spirit to be your guide. God’s Word is living and you will come away refreshed!
Review your church’s core beliefs and challenge yourself to dig deep about your own personal beliefs. Pray for fresh revelations from God in prayer – that He will give you guidance, divine direction and encouragement for the retirement journey. Ask God what He wants from you and how He plans to transform you in this new season. Talk to friends who have retired before you and ask for advice on how to keep growing in your faith. Discuss spiritual topics with friends to bring in new and fresh thoughts to your own spiritual life. Instead of jumping off the cliff into the abyss of lots of wasted time, begin to build a firm foundation for what your life as a disciple of Christ will look like in the days ahead.
Embrace the idea of transformation – God is so vast that all of our days on earth will not bring us close to knowing him fully. We have so much more to learn, He has so much more to do in us. Our waking thought should be focused on His goodness and grace that flows over us as He walks each stage of life with us. We should be jumping out of bed in anticipation of what God has to show us today, what will we learn about his Kingdom, about His desires for our lives – how to love others well, how to serve our communities, how to walk in the light of Christ.
Be transformed, build your spiritual foundation for retirement. Allow God room to work in and through you to bless others around you. Don’t allow the ways of the world to hold you captive to an idea of retirement that denies you so much joy and instead let God continue to transform you.
Don't Waste Your Retirement 