Why Avoid Endings?

We spend so much of our lives trying to avoid endings.

Whether it’s jobs, relationships, dreams, seasons … even versions of ourselves we’ve outgrown. And I don’t know if we do that because they often feel like failure or if it’s the permanency that scares us more … Maybe it’s the fear of being forced into a future that we didn’t choose or tee up on our own. Or maybe it’s because we can’t imagine anything good coming from what we’ve lost?

Whatever it is, I noticed something while I was reading this morning that I can’t seem to shake.

A conversation I had recently has been replaying and replaying and replaying. A friend of mine is standing in the middle of one of those life changing decisions that most of us hope we never have to make. They’re trying to discern whether it’s time to close their business and step onto a new path, and with that comes all of the questions we naturally ask. What if this isn’t the right decision? What if I misunderstood what God was asking me to do? What if I walk away from something familiar only to discover I made a terrible mistake?

As we talked, I couldn’t help but laugh at something I’ve realized about myself over the years. We all say we wish God would simply show us the plan, but if He handed us every detail in advance, if he sent us an email laying everything out point by point, we’d probably still spend the next week asking, “Are You sure?” We would analyze it, question it, and wonder if we had somehow misunderstood it anyway.

That conversation stayed with me as I opened my Bible this morning, and suddenly I noticed a pattern I had never really stopped to appreciate before.

Genesis 23 tells the story of Sarah’s death. It’s a chapter that would be easy to skim because at first glance, it feels like little more than funeral arrangements. Abraham mourns the loss of his wife, negotiates with the Hittites, and purchases the cave of Machpelah along with the surrounding field so he can bury her.

It doesn’t seem like the kind of chapter that would change the way you think about life.

But then I realized something…This wasn’t just a burial site. It was the very first piece of the Promised Land that Abraham would ever legally own.

After decades of wandering through the land God had promised him, living in tents and trusting a promise he could not yet see, the first permanent claim he made wasn’t a home to live in or a field to farm. It was a place to bury the woman he loved.

That’s such an unexpected way for God’s promise to begin taking shape.

I’m sure Sarah’s death didn’t feel like progress….if anything it probably felt like heartbreak. It probably raised more questions than it answered. Yet while Abraham was grieving what had ended, God was quietly establishing the first permanent foothold of everything He had promised.

That pattern shouldn’t surprise us, because we see it throughout Scripture.

The cross looked like the end before it became the beginning of our salvation. A sealed tomb looked like defeat before it became the place where death itself was overcome. Again and again, what looks like an ending from our perspective becomes the place where God begins writing a new chapter.

Maybe that’s why we spend so much energy trying to avoid endings. We can only see what we’re losing, while God can already see what He’s preparing.

Lord,

Thank You for reminding us that You are never surprised by the endings we face. While we often see loss, uncertainty, and closed doors, You see the story You are still writing.

Wrap Your comfort around every heart that is grieving today. Fill those standing at a crossroads with wisdom, and replace the anxiety of uncertainty with the peace that only You can provide. As we take the next step with the understanding we have today, strengthen our faith to trust that even when we cannot see the whole path, You are already waiting there.

Teach us to hold our plans with open hands while anchoring our hope firmly in You. Instead of measuring Your faithfulness by our circumstances, help us remember that Your character has never changed. Again and again, You have proven that You are able to bring new life from places that looked like the end.

No ending is beyond Your ability to redeem, and no season is beyond Your reach. Continue shaping our hearts until trusting You becomes more natural than fearing the unknown. No matter what tomorrow holds, remind us that the Author of our story is still writing, and every page is safely in Your hands.

In Jesus’ name, amen.