Planned. Out.
This is how my whole life has been, up until now. No matter where I was, I always knew what would happen next. Sure, I “trusted” God. I prayed that God would give me direction, to show me what I was supposed to do. But that's where my faith ended, and my own ability started. It's like God's plan was Plan A, but I always had Plan B, Plan C, Plan D, Plan E, so on and so forth. Ya know, just in case God's plan didn't work out.
You would think by now I'd learn to trust God's plan. No matter how much effort, no matter how much sweat, blood, and tears I poured into making sure I had things figured out, God's impeccable plan always prevailed.
In high school, I made sure to have perfect grades so I could go to a prestigious university. I didn't have any desire to go to a Christian school, and I sure as heck didn't want to go to Liberty. Well, lo and behold, I ended up at the big 'ol LU. Okay God, I went where you wanted me to go for undergrad, I think I should get to have a little say in where I go to grad school. And by little, I mean the only say.
So I did everything I possibly could to make sure my grad school plans were set. Grades. GRE. References. Internships. All the things I needed for a one-way ticket to go to whatever school I chose. I applied to probably 10 or 15 different schools, and door after door after door was closed. What the heck God? I know you wanted me to go to grad school, why can't I at least have some input?
I ended up graduating from Liberty with no grad school, no job, no prospects, nothing. I had done everything “right,” and still my plans hadn't panned out. Half-way through the summer, the Radford University door flew wide open for grad school. Really, God? You see, Radford was at the very, very bottom of that 10 to 15 schools list. My own plans had been thwarted, yet again.
The next step was to get a job, get married, start that whole “American Dream” thing. I knew in my heart that the marriage and job weren't what God desired for me, but I had gotten to the point where I didn't really care. God had made all the big life decisions for the previous 5 years (not without a little resistance from me, I might add), so I thought it was my turn. I thought my plans must be better than His, that my way was better.
Well, as you can tell, I'm not married and I'm not working at a salaried job. Through a series of circumstances, God radically called my heart away from all of my well-thought out and purposeful plans, back to Him. I'm now in my eleventh month of living overseas, and I land in America four short weeks from Friday. And I don't have a clue what's next. No job. No plans. No prospects. Nothing.
And you know what? I've never had so much peace. The only thing God's shown me is that He's got something big in store, but no deets, no info, no 411. And for the first time in my life, I'm content with that. I've learned that faith is literally taking God as His word. Not having a Plan B, C, or Z, but trusting what God says. Are you willing to take that step of faith?
