By Todd Paetznick, January 30, 2025

Adaptation is humanity’s greatest strength. The ability to change along with changing surroundings leads a person to survive and thrive. We live in a time with the most significant rate of change people have ever known.  The ability to adapt is more valuable now than it has ever been because of how rapidly everything is becoming different.  Change is both a threat and an opportunity.  For the people who are unwilling or cannot change, the threat they face is irrelevancy, obsolescence, and poverty.  However, there is an opportunity to thrive for people who are prepared for change, in whatever form it may take, and are willing to act.  

Most of us want to be in the latter category of people prepared for change.  How do we get ready to take action when the opportunity presents itself?  We develop our potential.  In scientific terms, potential can be thought of like a compressed spring, ready to change shape and expand as soon as its constricting force is removed.  Energy is stored in the compressed spring, ready to be released when needed.  For people, having potential is about preparation to do something unknown when there is an opportunity at some point in the future.  Potential is a starting point that gives one person an advantage; they are ready to spring into action when others need more time for further training and preparation.  A person with potential is already prepared.  They can act and seize the opportunity when they see it.  

Looking back, most people did not expect many of the most disruptive advances.  To them, change was unforeseen.  Like many people today, our ancestors expected everything to operate the same throughout their lives.  A few visionaries saw problems as an opportunity, however.  They did something to solve the problem and, in many cases, benefited from the outcome.  An awareness of the previously unknown opportunity changed how things were accomplished.  

Technological advances have changed the world and made it a smaller place.  Communication advances make possible instant interaction with nearly anyone anywhere in the world.  Transportation advances make rapid travel possible; a person can be nearly anywhere on the planet within a day. Furthermore, advances in transportation and logistics systems allow for quick, easy, and cost-effective shipping of goods nearly anywhere in the world.  Technological advances have led to computer systems and robotics that have changed the economics and the means to accomplish work.  The jobs once done by people can now be performed better, faster, and cheaper by machines.  

All of the advances resulted in globalization and the implication of shifting jobs.  Someone located nearly anywhere in the world can now accomplish tasks that once needed to be done within a local community.  The change in the production location of goods to nearly anywhere in the world has had a likely unexpected effect on personal and national economics.  A job that was once a person’s specialty in the United States may now be done by a person in the Far East for much less money.  

Adaptation is needed to address the competitive technological and geopolitical forces that affect many of us.  Developing our potential is the best means to combat uncertainty regarding future changes.   As Christians in the workplace, we should embrace and not fear change, including changes that may affect our livelihood.   God cares about us and our futures; we need not be afraid.  “[Make sure that] your character is free from the love of money, being content with what you have; for He Himself has said, “I WILL NEVER DESERT YOU, NOR WILL I EVER ABANDON YOU,” so that we confidently say, “THE LORD IS MY HELPER, I WILL NOT BE AFRAID. WHAT WILL MAN DO TO ME?” (Hebrews 13:5-6 NASB20).