Interim
[noun] the intervening time
[adjective] in or for the intervening period; provisional or temporary
synonym- continual, permanent
Before I became a Christian, the only reason I would hear someone use the term "season" would be referring to winter, summer, fall, or spring. The Christian church expands on its other meaning perhaps infinitely more then the average non-churchgoer. A "season" being a period of time marked by some event or person or feeling or substantial change or occurrence in life.
The problem with this is sometimes there are really great seasons, sometimes there are extremely rough ones, but then lastly, the worst kind I usually see as being the ones right in between. The transitional seasons, the ones bridging the gap between two huge life experiences. The ones that occur when life is blah and bland and there isn't a whole ton of things to be crazy passionate about. The ones that your passion maybe even seems to be ripped from right out of your hands in. The ones where the days you feel "eh" outweigh the days you feel phenomenal. The ones where you know you have a whole slew of people you could go to, but at the end of the day you weirdly feel like you have a lot less then you thought. The ones where you are waiting for something crazy exciting to happen to make all the "blah" fade and pass away.
However, I think this philosophy I had constructed for so long kind of fell out from under itself lately as I realized how I had it all wrong. I had this view of life being SO up and down (and truth be told it feels like that) but trying to look at it beyond just my own self, God is constantly preparing us for something bigger and better. It is not just up and down of bad season after good season after a bland "eh" season. It is not unintentionally planned out and handed to you by God. He's too good for that.
I see it now (as cliche as it is) as a constant uphill walk. It feels harder, but you get stronger and you get rewarded more and more the harder and longer you push yourself. And how often does God graciously sprinkle goodness and blessings along the way? All the time. Sometimes you want to give up, but in some seasons it is so good you know you can truly push through anything. The power in each period of your life is it maybe doesn't always make sense when you are living it, but it makes sense after you've lived it. You are being prepped for something magnificent, you just have to endure a few stumbling blocks in the road to get you there. The interim periods of feeling "blah" and feeling "eh" are powerful because it is in the moments you feel not entirely yourself, the moments where you feel you've lost your zest and your fervor for life, it is in the moments that nothing bad is happening but nothing crazy great is happening either, that you can truly rely on God in a way that those other seasons (however horrible or however great) you just don't experience Him the same in. When things are great you praise Him and thank Him and live out of gratitude and grace. When life is hard you beg Him and seek Him harder and live out of humbleness and security in Him. But when life is feeling rather blah, mundane, purposeless, and you wake up feeling not yourself... you do all of that. You praise Him because He is still good and still on His throne, you thank Him because you know hardships and this surely isn't the worst of them, you live out of gratitude and grace because you know it surely could be a lot worse then it is, you beg Him because you just want life to be insanely beautiful and full of purpose again, you seek Him harder because you are feeling the distance and you know it's not His fault, and you live out of humbleness and security in Him because you know that He has it all figured out, even when you don't.
"Everything is interim. Every season that I thought was stable and would be just how it was for a long time ended up being a preparation or a path to the next thing. When you decide to be on this journey with God, everything is interim" -Shauna Niequist
How beautiful is it that she views everything as being interim? As everything needing us to seek Christ with all of our being and our desire. She views life as a constant 'temporary'. What is permanent is above, so we have to choose as believers in Jesus to be okay with the temporary seasons for now.
Nothing is guaranteed, and that's okay.
