Then tonight I was talking to friends on the phone about my job hunt and I realized I was letting my concern over not having a job overpower my faith in the Lord. He called me here to seek His Will through the study of His Word. He didn't call me here to worry about getting a job. He is going to provide, and it will be in a way that only He can.
I took a step of faith by coming out to San Diego before I had all the funds together for Impact195, or before I had figured out where I was going to stay, or had a job. Well, He's provided a place to stay while in service to Him - of course there's rent, but it's modest and more importantly I'm learning to live in a house with people - something I've never wanted to do.
This step of faith has been rewarded already not just in knowledge of His Word but in a deeper and greater understanding of His Will. This has been centering for me, just a week in. I can only imagine the things that God has in store for me a year from now. The steps of faith that I'll take when trusting in Him, and the diligence and integrity that I will have gained so that He may trust more in me.
Worrying about a job is idolatry. I've let the concern of not being able to pay the bills be motivating rather than falling into absolute trust that the unfailing Creator Of All brought me out here to let me fail and increase my debt. I'm not talking about prosperity - I never want that. Extra white teeth don't suit me at all. No. I'm talking about taking care of my needs.
God made provision for me to come to Impact195 through His faithful. Not through any work of my own. I didn't work hard and save my money to do this. The opposite is true. I failed at everything else, and lost all the hard work I'd put into my television project, I've lost one of my dearest friends who has been a brother to me. I've had an immense season of loss this summer. It has not been good.
Yet God made a way for me to make the expensive move to San Diego to wrap myself in His Word and have a great and deep understanding of Him and His expectations of me. His Will. He used my own head-strongnes, stubbornness and folly to bring me to my knees before Him. Despite myself and what my own (alleged) intellect would have agreed was a good move.
A job is not a big task for the Lord-God who created every single opportunity in the universe. Not an obstacle. Nothing is an obstacle to Him, and if I am faithfully seeking Him and His Will, then no one but God can be praised when He provides the miracles and evidence - The Testimony - that He is in charge. No one who has supported this endeavor can say that they have more claim to this success or have invested more into me than anyone else. No one has invested more than Jesus, and no one gets more credit than the Lord who designed this very moment even before the foundations of the earth.
So why worry? What do I have to fear?
Luke 12:24 - Consider the ravens, for they neither sow nor reap, which have neither storehouse nor barn; and God feeds them. Of how much more value are you than the birds? (NKJV)
I'm not saying that I plan to be irresponsible. I will continue to seek employment, and hope to work to earn money to pay for my living. I need food, have a car payment, insurance, gas money, and still some owed on tuition at Impact195. Very rapidly, by the end of this month, there will be debt. I have felt that pressing down on me knowing that next week I will be totally out of contact with the outside world and wont be able to look for work. But I can't let this fear rule me.
I could apply for every job in the world and still not get it if it's not God's Will, and it is His Will that He be known to each and every person on Earth. I pray that He uses me to further that intention and I believe that He will do so by His perfect design.
Times are tough. No one has work, and those who do don't have money, and those who do aren't likely to give it frivolously. That is why I am asking you to pray. Pray that you, too, will see His Will at work in my life, and through the miracles He does around me.
Joshua 5:3 - And Joshua said to the people "Sanctify yourselves, for tomorrow the LORD will do wonders among you," (NKJV)
Tonight - before writing this entry - I asked the Lord for forgiveness for worrying, for putting what I perceived as my own concerns before my trust and faith in Him. You'd think after all the amazing things I've seen Him do to get me here that I'd be able to faithfully say that I know He will provide - yet I'm a sinner. My flesh causes doubt. My brain tricks me up. Stupid brain.
I have prayed that tomorrow He will do great things around me. I have set aside the day to see Him work wonders and miracles. While He may not provide a job for me tomorrow, nor may He miraculously cause me to win the lottery that I don't play - what He will do, and I believe this entirely, is reveal Himself to me, and to you, through a way neither of us ever thought previously possible.
Miracles happen. I'm not prophesying. I'm not saying that something huge will happen. I'm just saying that faith and obedience to the Lord does not go unrewarded. Again, not prosperity. His rewards are never-ending.
Ecclesiastes 3:14 - I know that whatever God does, It shall be forever. Nothing can be added to it, And nothing taken from it. God does it, that men should fear before Him. (NKJV)
He does things that last forever. Whatever miracle He chooses to make happen, whatever opportunity to serve, obey and praise Him that may first appear to be an obstacle - it will be for His Glory so that He shall be known and praised for all time.
Psalms 31:24
ReplyDeleteI often find when I'm doing what I should, serving, things have a way of working out. Whether it's an answer, it's help, or some small miracle...sometimes it's not in a way I'd expect, and always it's in a way that teaches me something.