Limitless

Lately, I've had a lot on my mind about the future. More specifically, MY future. Such thoughts are only natural for a recent graduate that is driven and passionate about so many different, often contradicting things. Opportunities arise for money, for meaning, for adventure, each one leaving me confused about which path to take.  

The National Center for Education Statistics projects that 1,606,000 students at the bachelor's degree level will graduate in 2014. That is, 1 million, 605 thousand, and 999 hundred people other than myself, starting lives and careers, paying student loans, and making decisions that will affect the rest of their lives. Many of the private school kids got that "ring by spring" and are getting married, many of them will now be the teacher instead of being the student, some of them will hate their jobs, and some of them won't be able to find one at all. And then there's me...

I have no idea how many of those graduates are followers of Christ, but I know that I am one of them. And I also know that my future plans mean nothing to me without Him in them. I'm trying so hard, in the midst of the post-college confusion, to trust Him with my future while also trying to decipher what He wants for me. So in my attempt to develop a spiritually healthy view of what it means to be guided by Christ and His promise to "be a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path (Ps. 119:105)," I have learned a few things.

Today, as I sat in a church in Alabama, my mind began to wander (as it often does on account of the A.D.D.) about the future. The speaker was talking out of the book of Joshua about promises. At the end of Joshua's life, he spoke a word to the Israelites. He told them to remember and to align; remember the promises that you have seen God fulfill in your life, and align your life with God. He talked about magnets and the way that if you turn them a certain way they reject each other. He said that God's polarity never changes.

Which made me think, for all of those graduates that don't know God, these decisions are so much easier. They make these decisions based on facts; salary, location, obligation, what they are good at, comfort zones, etc. And for a moment I envied them. Not for not knowing God, for that my heart breaks, but merely for the ease in which they can make a choice about their life. I hate making decisions. I think deep down I'm afraid of regretting my decisions. Ordering the wrong drink at Starbucks, regret. Trying to pick a movie and then hating it, regret. Missing out on an amazing plan that God had for my life because of one of those facts--salary, location, obligation, things I'm good at, comfort zones, etc., BIG TIME REGRET. That's why it's harder for believers, it isn't black and white. I can't base anything on fact, because sometimes God's plan doesn't make sense, its out of the box, because it's GOD and He isn't limited to a human brain with human expectations. He isn't limited at all. And THAT is scary, because I AM limited.

I mean I'm not asking for a life map or a blueprint for forever. I know He didn't promise the whole picture. He only promised enough light for me to see my feet. But sometimes, I doubt what I see, that maybe what looks like a good next step, isn't what He has for me. I know what I want... I want to love people with grace and humility, I want to live for the renown of God (Is. 26:8), I want to have a husband that is the shadow of a great rock (Is. 32:2) that leads me in Christ, that I can love and serve and encourage daily, I want to raise children that fear the Lord and have the courage to go against the spirit of the age (2 Tim. 3), I want to travel and experience history in the places where it was made, I want to be a friend that listens and gives generously, I want to have nothing but posses everything (2 Cor, 6:10), I want to look back at the end of my life and know that I was ALWAYS living within the will of the Lord. So, with all of my extremely low expectations for my life, how do I proceed? For the answer to that question, I have asked wise people and searched the Word. Here's what I have found.

1. Someone once told me that, "sometimes God provides options for those people who have a heart that He trusts." I don't know about you, but that made me not want God to trust my heart. I want Him to give me an exact plan, with exact details, that put me in the exact place that He wants me to be in. And that takes me to number two...
2. In a Louie Giglio (I can't describe how much I love him) sermon called, "Breath on the Page," that discussed the relevance and power of the Word of God, Louie made a great point about the future. He said that if God gave us exact plans, we wouldn't "need" him anymore. He wants relationship with us, He wants to be on the journey with us, so He can't give us the whole thing, He gives pieces that will allow us to follow blindly while remaining in close contact and constant conversation with Him. I LOVE that. The fact that He wants to know me, just makes me smile. It makes the fear of future and of regret completely bearable.
3. Hold on to His promises. I know that its the most cliché verse in the Bible, but its also the very breath of God on a page (thanks for that one Louie)! Jeremiah 29:11 reminds me what I have been promised; hope and a future. It is my belief through my own conversations and time with my Lord and Savior, that he has called me to and promised me that I will be a wife one day. I know that many people are called to singleness (which is amazing), and I think that God took me through the idea of that to prove to me that as long as I had Him I could totally do it. However, on the other side of Him making a point, He promised me that He created me and has been growing me to eventually be one kick ass wife. And that is a promise that I hold very tightly too. Especially on the hard days, when it feels like I'm not living up to the cultural expectations by being single, that I'm not good enough or that my expectations are too high, or when I'm just plain old tired of being alone and having to wait. On those days, I remind myself of the things that He has promised me and the ways that I have seen him fulfill promises in my life and in the lives of others, which reminds me about number four...
4. Today I received new advice. Remember and align. I may not be able to see ahead, but I can see behind and I can see right now. Based on what I can see, I know that where I want to be is in alignment with God. There are certainly things I can't control, but there are also things I can control, like my own polarity. God's doesn't change so I need to be sure that mine doesn't reject His.
5. Lastly, I once read in my favorite magazine, Relevant, this quote, "We need to do away with the idea that He wants us to go to Him in order to find out our future. Instead, God wants us to go to Him to be transformed in our heart and mind. God's past, present, and future plans for your life have one constant: His glory. And if God has transformed our hearts, our decisions will be made with His glory in mind." This piece of advice is my favorite. Because it reminds me that its not about me and my future. It's about HIS future, HIS glory, HIS fame. It reminds me that if I allow myself to be transformed I CANNOT fail. That even if I am limited, He is not! That the freaking holy spirit and all of its power lives in me. NO wonder He trusts my heart, He resides in it.

People tell us to follow our hearts, and for us recent grads that's easier said than done. But I am one of the lucky ones. I no longer envy those whose decisions are made by facts, because the fact is that my heart is guided by Christ. If I follow my heart, for the world, for people, for missions and ministry, for orphans and widows, I will end up where He wants me. 

 

The possibilities are up to Him, and much like He is, they are LIMITLESS.