My Day

I sit in my car.  Nothing feels like enough.  I long for that feeling which one finds on the first sunny Spring day…

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The birds are chirping.  The air is crisp and clean.  The sun is shining, making every color bolder, brighter, more colorful.  The very air declares lightness, brightness and goodness.  In your heart, there rings a melody.  All creatures of our God and King lift up their voices and with you sing.  All is good and right.  God is on the throne.  Brightness and lightness are the sum of the feeling of life.

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It seems that that feeling is within grasp: all I need is the right place to live, the right car, the right job.  My house should be full of windows - or at very least an open floor-plan apartment above a few shops.  My car should be nothing short of a pumpkin orange Mini Cooper.  My job should somehow consist of writing, encouraging, learning, and discipling.  I should guide my own schedule and have no responsibility but to love people and do life with them.  I should find value in what I am learning (which should be in a classroom format), but the requirements on my time should be light, such that I still have time to write what I want to write and pour into people’s lives.

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I know in my heart that what I am longing for is Heaven.  This junction of despondence and hope calls to something beyond this world.  Somehow, when we long for more than this world has to offer, we are reminded that we are not made for this world.  

I remind myself that God is in control.

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In tears, I call my mom.  I tell her that I have nowhere to go, nothing to do.  She notes that, in the city, there are a million people and each one feels alone.
I tell her that I want to live in a house: without roommates and that I own.  I tell her that I do not want to be committed to staying in Grand Rapids.  An apartment would be close enough, so long as it meets certain qualifications.  I want to travel.  I want to make a database of people in my church and what they do.  I want to write.  To speak.  To make coffee.  I want to love people.  I want to go to seminary.  I want to be a connection point between dreams, callings and ministries.
My brother is so different from me.  He has to be asked where he wants to be in five years and what he should do next to get there.  I, on the other hand, have to be reminded that this is only today.  This is one afternoon.  This is one month.  If I need to find a new job or new place to live soon, so be it.  In taking this or that job, in finding this or that place to live, in missing a deadline for this summer’s internship application… it is only today. 
I ask my mom what to do today and she tells me she does not know.  I sob that I do not know what to do and I do not want to go home.  I dream of going to a coffee shop and writing.  It sounds like the sunny-Spring-day feeling.
Since I am unsure what else to do with my day, I head back to my car.  My feet are cold: walking around this cemetery barefoot was a bad choice.  I text a friend and ask to borrow a laptop.  My plan is to go downtown to a coffee shop where I always feel at home.

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In reality, I am neither at the cemetery, nor on the phone with my mom, nor sitting in my car (though I was a little while ago).  I am in my friends’ apartment, using Ryan’s laptop.  All I have eaten today is a yogurt, a cup of coffee, and two chocolate chip cookies.  I am hungry, the sky is cloudy, and I will not have a movie-perfect apartment or house.
In reality, life is not made up of sunny-Spring-day feelings.  Life is made up of daily choosing to be content, to embrace God’s plan for my life, and remind myself of His proven faithfulness in my life.  The feeling of confidence in God’s love is better than the sunny-Spring-day feeling.  God’s love pours over me and reminds me that I will only be happy and satisfied in Him.  Even the perfect car and perfect job will not satisfy: within days, the dirt on the windows and the clouds in the sky would block the sunshine.  The need for gas and a new turn signal bulb would dampen the glamour of owning a Mini. My new job would leave me feeling tired and incapable.  

In reality, the only thing I know for sure in this life is God.  I know many things about Him, but those things on which I can anchor my life.  I know that He is good.  I know He loves me.  I know His plans for me are better than the ones I make for myself.  These three sentences have been my mantra before, and now they will be again.  My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus blood and righteousness.
We relegate the Gospel to the lives only of people who have not accepted Christ, as if it only holds value for them.  In reality, the Gospel may hold more value for me:  God is good, God loves me, and His plans for me - as His child - are good.  Do not these sentences both sum up and pour forth from the Gospel?  Do they not contain drastic implications for my life, if I claim to follow this good God?  Can I not rest securely knowing that He has proven himself to me?

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Sing them over again to me, wonderful words of life.
Let me more of their beauty see, wonderful words of life. 

Words of life and beauty, teach me faith and duty. 

Beautiful words, wonderful words, wonderful words of life. 

Christ the blessed one gives to all, wonderful words of life.
Sinner list’ to the Gospel call, wonderful words of life.
All so freely given, wooing us to Heaven.
Beautiful words, wonderful words, wonderful words of life.

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