Middle Time

In 1976 I read a poem called Middle Time in a copy of His magazine, a publication of InterVarsity Christian Fellowship from 1941 to 1986, that became my all-time favorite because its message has always been real and relevant in every period of my life. I am always in the middle time of something. Beginnings and endings seem short compared to most middle times in my life.

I chose the name Associates in Accomplishment for our nonprofit organization from the last line of this poem and have quoted excerpts from it more times than I can remember.

It reminds me that while change is a constant in life I am never without the stabilizing, balancing truth found in the Bible in the book of Hebrews that Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

It is a daily encouragement to me to realize that I am a work in progress and that Jesus is the completer of me and my unfinished work and times.

Middle Time

Between the exhilaration of Beginning
and the satisfaction of concluding
is the Middle Time
of enduring, changing, trying,
despairing , continuing, becoming.

Jesus Christ was the man of God's Middle Time
Between Creation and...Accomplisment.
Through Him God said of Creation,
"Without Mistake."
And of Accomplishment,
"Without doubt."

And we in our Middle Times
of wondering, waiting, hurrying,
hesitating, regretting, revising;
We who have begun many things -
And seen but few completed;
We who are becoming more - and less
through the evidence of God's Middle Time
have a stabilizing hint
that we are not mistakes,
that we are irreplaceable,
that our Being is of interest,
and our Doing is of Purpose,
That our Being and our Doing
are surrounded by AMEN.

Jesus Christ is the Completer
of unfinished people
with unfinished work
in unflinished times.

May He Keep us from sinking, ceasing,
wasting, solidifying - 
that we may be for Him
experimenters, enablers, encouragers,
and associates in Accomplishment.

Lona Fowler