Despite years of "having a plan", I find myself going back to the drawing board over and over. I shall explain:
Wandering: My life has been chopped into two-four year segments. At the outset of life, these segments seemed to go by at a slow, monotonous pace, allowing me to dwell in relationships and soak in any details. As life continues, this pace accelerates faster than I can handle. So life then becomes characterized not as much by the segments but the in-between times; "transition" time. Someone I know recently commented that life seemed like nothing but a series of transitions. It would seem that as one deals with more and more of these transitions, they might get easier to handle. However, I have found the reverse to be true. They get bumpier and bumpier as the desire to finally settle becomes stronger and as the frustration of transitory relationships becomes exhausting. After I graduated from college I found myself in a jobless time of transition (way to graduate right as the economy plummets). I decided to go to seminary. Two rapid years later, I find myself at another time of transition. I must now decide what the next segment looks like. The temptation here is to bury my head in the sand and refuse to make a decision. I would like to work at my job for a while. But as people get used to the fact that I am a wandering single twenty-something, they always ask, "So what are your plans?" or "What's next?" Next? Does there always have to be a next? The truth is, I had a plan. The plan didn't work. So I created another plan, and that one didn't work either. So I stopped planning. My worship pastor once said, "If you want to make God laugh, tell Him your plans." I find it funny that sometimes people who throw themselves on the mercy of God by faith have no idea what's happening next. God told Abraham to go to the land that He will (future) show him. A map did not descend from Heaven that said, "Abe, call me when you get there for further instructions." Sometimes the sovereignty of God is a little push here, a quiet pull there, step by step, faith to faith. It is exhausting. Faith is exhausting. Sometimes I tell God, "If you could just tell me what's coming next I could handle it better." I think the response is usually, "But then you wouldn't trust Me in the process." Abraham was a wanderer. Does that mean it's OK for me to be one too?
As Chuck says in the T.V. show "Chuck":
ReplyDelete"Working on my five-year plan, just gotta choose a font."
I'm used to wandering. That's the only constant in my life sometimes, it seems.
Now that hubby wants to "settle down" in our own house, I feel a nomadic urge to buy a camper and never stay put in the same place twice.
I'm hoping we can compromise somehow.
Good luck on finding the next transition. And I don't think there's anything wrong with wandering.
"All who wander are not lost." - Tolkien
Yes. It is. Because eventually your going to wander into something. But even if you just kept wandering, well then good for you. In my mind this qualifies you as being very close to what the early New Testament church was. A group of wanderers with no job but to preach Christ. Its the one place we are all trying to work our way into, but few of us realize we are already there. If you have a church you have a home. And if you have a home, then your okay. Wandering is good and safe. (HIGHCHURCHHIGHCHURCHHIGHCHURCH). I remember back in the days of Torchbearers being preached at continuously about this idea that as long as you have Christ your good. God has this amazing way of directing wanderers who would normally be lost and confused. So don't feel ashamed about being a wandering pilgrim. There are worst things in life. Like try to imagine what your life would be like if you woke up one day and you were inside a tree, and you couldnt get out. Wow. That would suck. I mean that would be really really bad. The only thing that might be worst then that, is maybe being buried alive, but only conceptually. Practically its the same thing. So rejoice! Your going somewhere! Hopefully not inside a tree in a coffin buried somewhere deep underground. -sam
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