Tuesday, 3 June 2014
Not Freaking Out
Now that I'm done with finals, I've got an ample amount of time to decide what I'm going to do in the next three days. And the next year. And the rest of my life. (omg)
Friday, 25 April 2014
Attending the Call
For the past several months as graduation has approached, I've been struggling with where I should go after college and what I'm supposed to do with my life now. It's the burden of the college graduate, to go and do something with the degree we've spent four years working towards. The pressure to perform is inevitable. My friends were freaking out about it, my family was expecting something to come of their investment in my education, and when I seemed less concerned everyone assumed I wasn't taking it seriously.
I suppose I wasn't; my crisis early in the school year had caused me to trust completely in God. He had led me to where I was supposed to be before, he would do it again. But the pressures distracted me and caused mini existential crises as I frantically looked for a company or job that would define my worth in society. Wrong way to go, of course. Self-worth doesn't come with a job, a lesson I learned after crying about it to the wrong people.
I read a blog post about a good friend's call from God to go abroad and I think back to the months that I've been struggling. I've been dying to travel the world and work abroad as she is, to work as a missionary in beautiful foreign cities and desolate places. But God has made it clear to me where I'm supposed to go: home.
At first I thought it was just my desire to see my sisters again. I had no idea what I was going to do and so why not take a year off and settle for a bit? But I started building close relationships with college students I barely knew over my short school breaks and found myself more accepting of the culture I had never liked. Ideas came to mind of what I wanted the college ministry to look like and activities we could do together. Then things started opening up at my church and the college group coordinator stopped me one Sunday during spring break and told me, "We need to talk when you get back." Turns out she really wants me to work with the college ministry at my church. It was an answer that I had been praying for, but it was definitely not the one I had been expecting or hoping for.
As I was preparing to go back home around this time last year after an amazing experience abroad, I felt called to go back and work at my church. I've never liked my church and have always complained about the lack of organization and spiritual nurturing. But I never did anything about it and God told me that had to change. So last summer I started a Bible study for the newly blooming college ministry, saw acquaintances I've known for a good part of my life grow exponentially and develop as leaders and Christ-followers. And when they went off to school, we kept in contact and exchanged stories about college ministries and churches and prayer requests. It was a beautiful experience, seeing my friends grow and change into beautiful people, but I thought that was going to be it.
There are signs that I would like to ignore all pointing back home, but God's made it clear. I love college students and I know I want to work with them not only because they are close to my age, but because I can reach them and relate to them now while I'm fresh out. Few people will be happy with me going back with no direction except where God is leading me, but I trust Him. Maybe he won't tell me how I'm going to make money (maybe I won't!) or provide me with a paying job right away, but I will follow blindly, whether it be to the depths of the earth or to the house I have always wanted to escape from. He calls us to the places we need to be even if it's in the last place we ever would have expected.
Even if my family doesn't believe me, I believe God. He'll take me where I need to go and ease the burden to adhere to society's expectations. I've never been much of a people-pleaser anyway.
I suppose I wasn't; my crisis early in the school year had caused me to trust completely in God. He had led me to where I was supposed to be before, he would do it again. But the pressures distracted me and caused mini existential crises as I frantically looked for a company or job that would define my worth in society. Wrong way to go, of course. Self-worth doesn't come with a job, a lesson I learned after crying about it to the wrong people.
I read a blog post about a good friend's call from God to go abroad and I think back to the months that I've been struggling. I've been dying to travel the world and work abroad as she is, to work as a missionary in beautiful foreign cities and desolate places. But God has made it clear to me where I'm supposed to go: home.
At first I thought it was just my desire to see my sisters again. I had no idea what I was going to do and so why not take a year off and settle for a bit? But I started building close relationships with college students I barely knew over my short school breaks and found myself more accepting of the culture I had never liked. Ideas came to mind of what I wanted the college ministry to look like and activities we could do together. Then things started opening up at my church and the college group coordinator stopped me one Sunday during spring break and told me, "We need to talk when you get back." Turns out she really wants me to work with the college ministry at my church. It was an answer that I had been praying for, but it was definitely not the one I had been expecting or hoping for.
As I was preparing to go back home around this time last year after an amazing experience abroad, I felt called to go back and work at my church. I've never liked my church and have always complained about the lack of organization and spiritual nurturing. But I never did anything about it and God told me that had to change. So last summer I started a Bible study for the newly blooming college ministry, saw acquaintances I've known for a good part of my life grow exponentially and develop as leaders and Christ-followers. And when they went off to school, we kept in contact and exchanged stories about college ministries and churches and prayer requests. It was a beautiful experience, seeing my friends grow and change into beautiful people, but I thought that was going to be it.
There are signs that I would like to ignore all pointing back home, but God's made it clear. I love college students and I know I want to work with them not only because they are close to my age, but because I can reach them and relate to them now while I'm fresh out. Few people will be happy with me going back with no direction except where God is leading me, but I trust Him. Maybe he won't tell me how I'm going to make money (maybe I won't!) or provide me with a paying job right away, but I will follow blindly, whether it be to the depths of the earth or to the house I have always wanted to escape from. He calls us to the places we need to be even if it's in the last place we ever would have expected.
Even if my family doesn't believe me, I believe God. He'll take me where I need to go and ease the burden to adhere to society's expectations. I've never been much of a people-pleaser anyway.
Wednesday, 19 February 2014
Full Attention
May Your voice be louder,
May Your voice be clearer
Than all the others,
Than all the others.
May Your face be dearer,
May Your words be sweeter
Than all the others,
Than all the others in my life.
Please keep my eyes fixed on You.
Please root my heart so deep in You.
Keep me abiding, keep me abiding
Keep me abiding, that I would bear fruit.
May Your presence be truer,
May Your presence be nearer
Than all the others,
Than all the others.
May Your light shine brighter
May Your love move deeper
Than all the others, my God,
Than all the others in my life.
Please keep my eyes fixed on You
Please root my heart so deep in You.
Keep me abiding, keep me abiding,
Keep me abiding that I would bear fruit.
Please keep my eyes fixed on You.
Please root my heart so deep in You.
Keep me asking, keep me near,
Keep me abiding that I would bear fruit.
Draw me close, draw me close to You.
Oh, right next to Your heart,
Close to Your heart.
Please keep my eyes fixed on You.
Please root my heart so deep in You.
Keep me abiding, keep me abiding,
Keep me abiding that I would bear fruit.
Keep me asking, God keep me kneeling,
Keep me abiding that I would bear fruit.
-Jeremy Riddle
Friday, 22 November 2013
For the Lady Reads
A conversation between Evelina and Lord Merton:
Lord Merton: 'Whoever she is, I wish she would mind her own affairs: I don't know what the devil a woman lives for after thirty: she is only in other folks way. Shall you be at the assembly?'
Evelina: 'I believe not, my Lord.'
Lord Merton: 'No!--why then how in the world can you contrive to pass your time?'
Mrs. Selwyn (the slighted 30+): 'In a manner that your Lordship will think very extraordinary, for the young Lady reads.'
[Burn!]
(P.S. The most entertaining 18th century novel I've read so far)
Lord Merton: 'Whoever she is, I wish she would mind her own affairs: I don't know what the devil a woman lives for after thirty: she is only in other folks way. Shall you be at the assembly?'
Evelina: 'I believe not, my Lord.'
Lord Merton: 'No!--why then how in the world can you contrive to pass your time?'
Mrs. Selwyn (the slighted 30+): 'In a manner that your Lordship will think very extraordinary, for the young Lady reads.'
[Burn!]
-Frances Burney, Evelina
(P.S. The most entertaining 18th century novel I've read so far)
Friday, 25 October 2013
Thursday, 12 September 2013
On the Road by Kerouac
I'm currently reading Jack Kerouac's On the Road and it's brilliant, lovely, vulgar, upbeat, and chock full of big words, a clear representation of the Beat Generation and great quotes. I'll be posting them for a little while now while I read it, I'm sure. The quotes, that is.
Boys and girls in America have such a sad time together; sophistication demands that they submit to sex immediately without proper preliminary talk. Not courting talk--real straight talk about souls, for life is holy and every moment is precious.
--Jack Kerouac, On the Road
Tuesday, 10 September 2013
The Mad Ones
"The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow Roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars."
-Jack Kerouac, On the Road
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)