Worship Jam and my future

You make everything glorious

And I am Yours

What does that make me?

-David Crowder, "Everything Glorious"

Jesus, Savior, pilot me

over life's tempestuous sea;

unknown waves before me roll,

hiding rock and treacherous shoal.

Chart and compass come from thee;

Jesus, Savior, pilot me.

Man, God spoke to my heart at Worship Jam tonight. So I graduate in May, right? And people ask me, "Joy, what are you going to do after you graduate?" And I ask myself, "My gosh, what am I going to do after I graduate?" And I ask God, "God, what am I going to do after I graduate?" And so far, God tells me: nothing. And I tell myself: ask again. And I tell other people: "Oh, I have a lot of options, right now I'm considering publishing or local government, but I haven't ruled out grad school and I'm eventually going to get my teaching certificate."

Earlier this week, I had "coffee" (we actually both got free cups of water) with my friend Eric. Eric is a fantastic guy and a fantastic man of God. One of the things Eric and I talked about was "arriving." How as Christians, we often feel like we're waiting for the Lord to fulfill one of our Jesus-goals. Once He makes us (choose at least one)
a) more patient
b) more trusting
c) less gossip-y
d) without addictions or vices
e) a better person
then we will have Arrived. We will be A Christian. Or we wait for the Father to answer one of our prayers. When He gives us a job, a spouse, a child, a better grade, happiness, a better hair day, then we will be Complete and we will have Arrived.

But see, that's just not true. One of the amazing and amazingly hard things about following Christ is that you never Arrive. You may become more patient, but you're still waiting on that job. You got an A but your treasures are material possessions. Even if you check all the boxes of waiting and accomplishing and gaining...well, you can never check all the boxes. We cannot be Jesus. We can strive to be like Jesus, but we cannot Arrive at Being Jesus. And God loves us for it. Eric spoke at Worship Jam tonight, and as he said, God never withholds His love from us to teach us a lesson; He never punishes us for not being Jesus. He rewards us for being His children. He loves us because He loves us.

So, back to Arriving. I realized two things about my future tonight: first, I realized that I had been waiting to Arrive at my future. My attitude toward "what am I going to do after graduation" was as if that was the last question I was ever going to have to ask God. Once God sent down a lightning bolt or a carrier pigeon with a note saying "Apply to this company" or "Go to this grad program," then I would have Arrived at my future.

Well, that's just dumb, isn't it? It's like the saying, "Tomorrow never comes." I'm not going to Arrive at my future. The Lord will answer this particular question, and then He will answer all the questions that come after it. He's always going to be the pilot. And the wonderful thing is, He's so good at it! The answers to my questions are going to be glorious.

He makes everything glorious. Whatever the plans He has for me to prosper and not to harm me (Jeremiah 29:11), they are glorious! He will make them glorious! God's direction can never lead me to an inglorious end. Whatever I do in May, it will bring glory to my Father. It won't be a mediocre job that is fine for now: it will be glorious! It won't be a good-enough grad school that's, you know, better than doing nothing: it will be glorious! It won't be waiting to fulfill my potential: it will be glorious!

I mean, gee, it just doesn't get better than that!