I had just graduated from Southern Methodist University, and was nearly ready to leave for graduate school at Duke University. Early, on my last day before departure, I had decided to walk Heidi through Huffines Park, a wonderful wooded area near my home where I had spent many boyhood hours playing with my friends. I spent some time wandering along the old trails that I had followed as a young boy, amazed at how much of the terrain I still remembered-and at how little it had changed. I walked around the park, lost in my boyhood memories, until I came upon the playground where I had once spent many hours in imaginative flights of fancy.

Heidi was exhausted from all the walking, so I entered the playground and sat down on one of the benches where parents would sit to watch their children. There was only a single little girl in the park that day, along with her mother, who was not much older than I. As I sat and rested Heidi, the little girl came running over with her mom to "pet the doggie."

I told her it was okay, and Heidi gladly let the little girl stroke her between the ears. While this was going on, the little girl's mother sat down on the bench beside me and we talked for a few minutes about the weather and other matters of little consequence. She asked me what I did for a living, and I told her that I was in school, preparing for the ministry.

Hearing that horrible, dreaded word "school," the little girl looked up at me and said, eyes as big as saucers: "But grown-ups don't go to school."

It was like a knife, twisting in my heart. Grown Up? I'm not a grown-up, am I? I asked the little girl's mother the question, and she smiled and replied, "You certainly are to her." After assuring the little girl that "grown-ups" did, indeed, go to school, I got up and led Heidi away from the playground and back into the trail-blazed woods.

Me, a Grown-up? It didn't seem at all possible! After a few minutes of aimless wandering along the bike-paths I stopped in a clearing, sat down on a picnic-table bench, and stroked Heidi's graying fur as I pondered the question. As I was sitting there, two young boys came running into the clearing, one chasing the other. The one being chased tripped on a stone and went sprawling to the ground, and the other boy leapt on top of him and began to beat on him with his fists. I stood up and shouted at the boys to stop, which they promptly did-and then started laughing. They quickly explained that they were just playing, and that everything was okay. "Sorry to bother you, sir," said one of the boys as he and his chum walked off, still laughing.

And, as I stood there, staring after the boys, I came to the horrible realization that I was, indeed, a grown-up. Fifteen years had changed me. The feeling in the pit of my stomach was very uncomfortable. I looked down at Heidi, who was looking up at me with those brown eyes, full of adoration; I smiled, "Do you remember when I was that little?" Her eyes seemed to say "yes."

Change is not always fun. Time can bring many serious changes in an individual, or a community, or even a Church. As much as we would like to keep things the way they used to be, that's not always possible. Things change-and as they change, we must change too. I'm not saying that we should forget the past; far from it! Celebrate the past, learn from the past, and grow! But don't live in the past.

"But I don't like change!" "I don't want things to be different!" Few of us do. But we really can't stop the changes. Change will come, just as surely as little boys will become "grown-ups." But, even as the changes come, we can be assured that they won't overwhelm us if we keep doing what God has called us to do and if we remain faithful to the fundamental truth of the Gospel, which God has called us to proclaim. As we change, let us not get lost in our pain or in our past and continue to live and share the love of God with all. After all, we're Grown-ups.