As I've embarked on my journey of digging for who I am and what I like and what I'm like, often times I've unearthed a small clue about a bigger unknown part of myself. When this happens, I get really excited. Who WOULDN'T get excited?
But when I get excited, I have a tendency to make far too many assumptions about that bigger, still very hidden part of myself. I've habitually become so excited about unearthing the start of something huge, that I'd stop digging entirely and begin to plan a course of action around whatever I figured it meant.
My Real Life Example: YL Staff
When I was finishing college, God used some specific solitude times to make me passionate about lifelong ministry. And obviously, "lifelong ministry" could mean a whole freaking ton of things. But I knew that it could only mean one thing: going on Young Life staff.
I applied for Young Life staff, knowing that it was the logical next step. After all, I HAD been a leader for the past four years. I knew how to get kids jacked. I knew how to run a Young Life club.
To make a long story short, I didn't get affirmed to go on staff. And it was extremely hard. My self worth was thrown into question. What made me not good enough? Why am I worse than this other person who got to go on staff? The senior YL staffers who were responsible for making the decision were quick to let me know they were steering me in a different direction, and that it wasn't about worth, but I wasn't ready to hear that message. Because of course they were going to say that, I thought. It's the old classic "It's not you it's me, but it's actually you" routine.
All my eyes saw was a hypothetical Knoxville News Sentinel article, titled "Breaking: Tim Branch, Staff Kid, Doesn't Get Approved to Be on YL Staff."
To be brutally honest, I was embarrassed. All sorts of old self esteem wounds from my childhood and adolescence had opened up all of a sudden. I began to see my problems: I wasn't good enough at leading, I wasn't good enough at being charismatic, I wasn't funny enough, I wasn't good enough at saying the right thing at the right time.
But that wasn't really the problem.
The REAL problem was, God is way too passionate about me being EXACTLY who, what, and how I was designed to be to let me continue in a direction that's even slightly off base.
God is too excited about what He's creating to just let us do what we think we want. He loves us too much to give into our cries for what we think we were made for. Nothing can stand in the way of Him creating His masterpiece... not even the masterpiece itself.
I had plans to answer the call to lifelong ministry by going on YL staff. But I had misjudged the direction of my underground river. God had other plans, and they weren't to destroy my life and my confidence. He brought me somewhere tailored to my specific needs, the needs that HE knew were there but I didn't.
I took a high school internship position with Cedar Springs Presbyterian Church instead. I found out in my first months that God had created an environment to grow me in ways I never imagined. He addressed all sorts of strongholds that I had held onto as a YL volunteer leader, and He revealed to me some of my deepest passions and connection places. God had created this place just for me, from my coworkers to my bible study guys.
Here's What I've Learned
When things don't play out how you want them to, it doesn't mean you are unimportant, and it doesn't mean you're a second string Christian. It means God sees the path to creating your true self, and you don't. And it's leading off somewhere that doesn't look like the trail.
God has a way of leading people into the desert, and THEN speaking tenderly to them (Hosea 2:14). He also has this habit of bringing about a death in order to bring about new, transformed life (resurrection).
But He doesn't always explain himself before he takes the liberty of blasting our life plans, dreams, and goals to smithereens, does He?
In A Traveler Toward the Dawn, John Eagan sets up an interesting picture. He talks about his metaphorical building of a house, brick by brick (Go Vols), stone by stone, for 25 years. As he finishes his work, God rolls up with a huge cannon and starts blasting away the house he worked so hard to construct, story by story, with a huge grin on his face. It's almost as if He's proud of his destruction. What are you doing, God??
This is how it feels so often, isn't it? Each of his calculated, life-destroying explosions leaves an intense ringing in your ears. But if you are alert enough, you'll be able to make out the exclamation, "I won't let you settle!" from the ringing.
Obviously, YL staff isn't "settling" by any means. But for me, the growth I needed would never have happened unless I took the internship at the church. And that's why the YL staff people steered me away. Because they saw that for me, it would have been slightly different than where my heart (and God) was leading me.
Here's a relevant poem my dad wrote:
Undone
by Jim Branchyears and years of hard work
diligently putting it all together
piece by piece
thinking all is well
progress is being made
but then you
come and scramble the whole picture
leaving pieces scattered everywhere
you smile lovingly
as I sit in the middle of the mess
knowing that I don't know
knowing that I'm undone
and thinking to yourself
now that's progress
Jeremiah 29:11 - "For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."
Proverbs 19:21 - Many are the plans in a person's heart, but it is the Lord's purpose that prevails.
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