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.
