Thursday, September 1st: If I was going to secure an interview, it was going to be today. There were two full work days left before the start of school. “Was I going to be in the top 5? Was my number going to be high enough? Would I be able to excitedly start setting up my classroom before the start of school? Should I have applied for that .33 job in hindsight? Who else has gotten hired? Am I the only one?” Those questions flooded my mind as I waited by the phone, skeptical to make last minute plans with friends in hopes that I would be called for an interview. I was hopeful, not unrealistically so – I want to work with that team, I want to greet the students I love as they get off the bus and pass through those doors. I want God to use me in that place again.
I have been praying for His will to be done (my mouth more than my heart)- but yet secretly hoping that by praying that, God would give me what I most wanted. Who was I kidding? He’s God – he knows my affections, my thoughts, the intentions of my heart. He sees right through my inauthentic prayers filled with flowery words and secret wishes. Was I truly ready and willing to submit and obey the Lord in every sense of the word – where He leads, I will follow? I hoped so, I truly couldn’t answer the question to that. Easier said than done.
I felt the need yesterday to walk, literally walk with the Lord- I put my running shoes on, plugged my earbuds in, and walked. And while I walked, I talked to the Lord, I prayed, I cried, I smiled, I worshipped, I sang – aloud. (Aside: off tune singing while panting around the neighbourhood receives its fair share of judgemental looks.) Five kilometres and an album later, I looked at my watch: 4:41pm. The day was over, the phone hadn’t rang, there was no interview.
But from my walk, came the following:
1) If my hope is Christ alone, If where you are is where I’m home, if knowing you is my delight, if in God alone I’m satisfied… Then break this old heart of stone, start a fire in these broken bones, Convince my heart at last, Come tell me of all I have in you – God of Ages Past.
2) My identity is NOT in a number, but Christ who holds the power.
Where there was sin, Your loved rushed in, Where sin runs deep, Your grace runs deeper. For all enslaved, the ransom paid, light of the world, yours is the power. – Seas of Crimson
3) I believe in God the Father, I believe in Christ the Son, I believe in the Holy Spirit, Our God is three-in-one. I believe in the resurrection, that we will rise again, for I believe in the name of Jesus. – This I believe (The Creed)
4) My goal is not a job for a semester, or even for a year. But to know the Lord and imitate Christ. Would I give all I have just to know Him?
Oh to be like You, Give all I have just to know You. Jesus, there’s no one besides You, Forever the hope in my heart – Scandal of Grace (This is where we started having volume and pitch issues)
5) Jesus, He loves me, He is for me. – Jesus loves me (Chris Tomlin)
6) I want to imitate and emanate Christ.
Above and below me, Before and behind me, in every eye that sees me, Christ be all around me. – Christ be all around me (All Sons and Daughters)
7) It’s your breath in my lungs, so I pour out my praise to YOU ONLY. – Great are you Lord
I meditated on those songs yesterday, sang those words and God highlighted the words that stood out to me the most. I have been listening to this album on repeat x infinity x everyday. Shane & Shane: The Worship Initiative. (<– Go listen to it… do it, NOW!)
Today: It was 7 o’clock in the morning, I logged onto the website and viewed my job application history. That job that I hoped for, the job that I wanted. Filled. NOT BY ME. I am disappointed and saddened, slightly anxious and yet I know – that God is going to use me somewhere else for His glory. My hope is not gone, my joy is not gone, because I am (trying) to hope in the Lord, and He is the source of my joy. I do not have a job for the first day of school. I do not have a job (yet) for the semester. But I am still called to obey, to work for and to live for the glory of God. He is faithful and he is ALWAYS GOOD.
Grace upon Grace 