When graduating high school the verse I heard over and over was Jeremiah 29:11.
“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
I left high school ready to move on, ready for new friends and a new place I could call home. I wanted so badly to get away and start my new life, my new adventure. I didn’t know exactly what I was going to major in or what I wanted to do when I finished college; I was just going because that’s what every good middle class high school student did when they finished high school.
High School Graduation Picture
There is something so exciting, scary, unknown, and unfamiliar about graduating high school that makes Jeremiah 29:11 so perfect for this season of life.
For a while, I wanted to go to Georgia College and State University. Once I visited, I knew it wasn’t for me. My brother went to Georgia Tech at the Georgia Southern University campus and at first I didn’t want to follow him. Then I realized that I didn’t have to write an essay to get into GSU; so I applied, I got accepted, and I went. I spent 4 amazing years in Statesboro, Georgia.
Seth Barnes, the founder and executive director of Adventures in Missions, recently sent out a newsletter talking about discipling and teaching young people how to answer the question “Where has the time has gone?”
I am so glad I can say I know where it has gone. I look back now on when I first started college and just think “Wow! How the time has flown by! “I have lived the best four years of my life (from what I know so far). My college experience was so awesome. It was not always easy, not always perfect, not always fun, but definitely something to remember.
I wouldn’t have imagined it being like this. I never would have pictured ending up where I am.
And this is what brings me back to that verse in Jeremiah.
“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
Now, May 12th I will graduate college. I will be finished with school FOREVER (PRAISE THE GOOD LORD)!!! I have so much peace about what plans God has in store for me. I don’t know what they are. I don’t know what I’ll be doing when I come back from the Race in May 2013 and I don’t want to know now. All I need to know is that God has plans for me to prosper, grow, and mature. They won’t harm me, but they will be challenging. He will bring me hope and a good future.
Thank you Jesus for your promise. I will follow you. Hold me to that.
