500 Words: Day 2

Have I mentioned that I have no idea what I’m doing? (Career-wise…any-wise)

Shouldn’t I have all of this figured out by now?

I’ll turn 30 near the end of this year…30!! Don’t most people have their career stuff figured out by 30?

Apparently, I’m not most people.

I spent the first half of my 20’s trying a bunch of different things, because I didn’t think I could do what I wanted to do, and because I was terrified of choosing the wrong direction for my life. I was paralyzed by the fear that I might not pick the career God intended for me.

What I didn’t realize (and what I so wish that I had figured out), was that I just needed to finish/commit to SOMETHING, and God would nudge me onto the right path if I was going in the wrong direction.

I started to understand this in the second half of my twenties, when I came to comprehend all the goodness and grace of God’s gift to us in Christ.

When I finally understood who I was to God.

If you’re reading this right now, and you don’t have the whole Jesus thing figured out yet…well, let me tell you: He makes ALL the difference!

Once I fully grasped who I am in Christ, I stopped beating myself up (most of the time) about not knowing what I should do as a career.

See, I always thought it was what I did that would get me into God’s kingdom. That’s why I was so afraid of making a mistake when it came to my career! The truth is, it’s Who we love—Who we draw closer to, cling to, and put above all else—that gets us into the Kingdom. Not the things we do! (Hint: God. The “Who” is God–through the grace of Jesus.)

What a relief!!

 

When all of this dawned on me, I was able to let go of who I thought I should be, and begin walking down the path to being myself. The path to being who God made me to be!

And all of that disappointing stuff—all of those moments of defeat, of quitting, of allowing fear to rule my life—all of those moments that lead up to the financial situation Chad and I are climbing out of…

All of that crap is being redeemed!!

Because it’s God who directs my paths. He who has given me the desires of my heart is leading me on a journey to their completion. The dreams he has planted in me are meant to come to fruition!

And when I put my trust in him instead of in myself—when I stop worrying about whether I’m good enough, talented enough, confident enough, etc—it’s then that I’m walking down the path I was meant to take, whether it be in my career or otherwise.

This all sounds fabulous and a little crazy, right? I mean, how can I know for certain that, no matter the mistakes I make, when I put my life in God’s hands and choose to follow him, he will redeem those wrong turns?

For two reasons:

1.) I know this because when I was nine years old, the Holy Spirit told me I would marry Chad. 18 years later, after falling and straying from the path time and again, then finally—fully—giving my life into the hands of my Savior…well, I DID marry Chad!

2.) The Bible tells me so. (That sort of trumps the first reason, but I like telling my Chad story.)

When we are seeking God whole-heartedly, he realigns all of our mistakes and missteps, weaving them into the story he wrote for us before we were born. There is nothing we can do to mess up his plans for us.

Which is why, even though I have absolutely no idea what I’m doing, I’m not afraid. I know the dreams that I’ve been given are a future reality, because my hope rests in Him.

668 words. BOOM!