I have been getting involved in The Well Community Church recently.
They have a theology sort of class on Monday called Academy and we are studying “Developing a Biblical Worldview” while reading Total Truth by Nancy Pearcy. Nancy discusses all about how we aren’t treating the truth of Christianity like it is the total truth of all reality. Meaning that our Truth is relevant in every topic from art, literature, philosophy, astronomy to the business world. We are to bring the Truth in all parts of our lives even our culture. These two parts of our life, religious and American culture, shouldn’t be separate. I am not saying I am an expert or anything but I always had an easier time applying Christianity to everyday things whether they were religious or not.
Then today I started my Lifegroup. We are studying the book of Esther with Beth Moore. And guess what, Esther was in a non-believing culture even married to a non-believer. She was still following the Lord and fought for what she believed in no matter what. The book of Esther also doesn’t ever mention God but powerfully displays how God is sovereign. Here is a strong, bold woman making a difference for God in an unbelieving culture. She was applying her beliefs into the culture as a light.
It was crazy to me that I was studying these two similar topics while deciding between ministry or a secular vocation. The Lord was basically preparing me to enter back into the culture of America, work and all, with training on how to be His light in darkness.
He was guiding me to work in the secular work place.
But the Lord said I could choose what is next, isn’t he deciding for me? Yes but now I have to choose what vocation I want to do. But of course I can’t just choose anything in the world. He trusts me to look at my gifts and passions and then choose within my calling to work in the world.
I will be going back to school to get my Masters in School Counseling and a Pupil Personnel Services Credential to be a Counselor in the high school level.
I will be planning to attend National University in Fresno this summer and should be done in two years. This decision was harder to make because I was choosing to give up my desire for full time ministry. But I know that I am not called there. At first I wasn’t too excited about going back to school. But I think it is time for me and I am actually excited to study something I am interested in now.
Maybe it was my stubbornness about not wanting to go back to school. Maybe I didn’t want to do the logical worldly thing of getting a vocation. I wanted to be the one to enter full-time ministry to prove something to the world. Show them that you could do anything and you didn’t have to go to school to make a living or get a good paying job to survive.
But the Lord wanted me to spend my time telling students to find their calling.
They have this huge world out there.
They can answer that huge life-altering question anyway they want…however stressful that may be.
