Hrm, what's new? Well I was reading in Job the other day and there was a verse that said:
"What I have feared most has happened to me. What I dreaded has come true." (Job 3:25)
I've never really connected to Job. For pages and pages he's telling his friends, his wife and anyone who will listen that he curses the day he was born, his mother's womb, his father for impregnating his mother, his grandparents for... ok, the last two aren't true, but you get the picture. I mean, the dude had a right to complain-things were not going well for him but it always seemed too much for me, just like Song of Solomon is just too... well sexy I guess. I don't really want to read about Solomon's lady-friend's special parts and I don't usually want to read Job cursing everything that wasn't nailed down.
I've always connected Job to being in a really bad place (I know, I'm a genius) but that's not an easy place for me to go. I haven't lived a charmed life by any means, but back when I was dealing with depression, the last place I wanted to look for answers was the Bible. Bring it up to the present: I'm not depressed, but I'm not in a great place and for some reason, I was flipping through my Bible, landed on Job and found a connection.
"What I have feared most has happened to me. What I dreaded has come true."
You may laugh, but where I am right now is the place I've been fearing. I'm through college and making no forward progress. No progress with a career, no progress writing, no progress in my personal life and right now, just being real, no progress in my spiritual life. I have always feared stagnation, even more than I fear failure, even though that's a close second. When God told me to get a degree in Creative Writing, I thought He was nuts - still do sometimes, but I did it. Even after getting the degree that I loved, after 4 years at a college I loved and getting to do amazing things and meet amazing people, I'm questioning the wisdom of that decision. My degree choice has been one of the few things I've done in blind faith. I tried to be smart about it, do things along with taking classes that would give me experience, connections and did it well so I would have great references once college was through, but the decision to get a degree in Creative Writing was based on an encounter with God.
So what's all of this saying? What's my point? I'm not sure yet.
To be real, I'm struggling with taking what I know about God and embodying that knowledge. But I know even more that I have to struggle, struggle implies effort and effort means I haven't given up. I guess it's exciting because I know that I can't remain here. I can't stand stagnation and while I may not have the ability to control anything else in my life, I can turn to God during this, lean into Him and find progress there.
