Seems like there is a theme from yesterday about love and stuff so I thought that would be an appropriate song to start with. I wouldn't recommend the music video but I think the song is hysterical.
Yesterday I talked to my friend Sarah who met the guy she is now dating through eHarmony. She was trying to convince me to join... she's a pretty good sales woman, but I am still unconvinced. It's not that I have anything against it. More and more people I know have met through it or another version of it. In the process of our talk about it though she was saying that this guy likes her without her even trying- he just does. (Insert a choir of girls saying "awwwwwwwwwwww..." here) That comment has been rolling around in my head all night- isn't that what every girl wants?
It started me thinking about all the times in the past that I have tried really hard to get a guy to like me. You think the stories about Dr. Hockey are funny... I have journals full of other impressively awkward stories from high school and college. (Confession: I have some pretty good stories from before high school too- perfect example: Kindergarten Rachel chasing my neighbor Steven Farver up and down the bus aisle trying to kiss him. O dear!) I could go on, but then I would have to change the title of this blog to "Humiliating: Recollection's of my recent past."
Anyway, I don't mean this to sound pathetic and desperate because I am not. Truly, I am not.In some small way her comment was so encouraging though. Not that I mind the effort, but to work so hard so fruitlessly seems a bit masochistic. That's not what I want.... I want someone to "like me for me" and think I am "phat like Cindy Crawford." (If you're drawing a blank on the classic 90's tune that should be playing in your head)
Though I have had more practice that I ever would have liked; I am still not very good at this waiting business. And not just waiting about boys, but totally beyond that. Recently I've been feeling conflicted about where I am at in life and what I am waiting for. Finding words to go along with this has been difficult for me; so this 'lighter' subject makes it a bit easier.
This morning I talked with a girl who graduated from here about 3 years ago and has been working here since then. She was talking about the way the Lord has been teaching her to put all of her energies into where she has been placed right now- Moody Bible Institute. While I LOVE my job and my boss, I resonate with what she was saying. There is a concern always in the back of my mind about what I am doing here in Chicago. My major was international ministries-emphasis on the international. :) And here I am living in the cutest apartment I could imagine with my best guy friend just steps away, working at a familiar place with a kick butt boss, benefits and enough money to pay all my bills. SOOOOO not what I was thinking my life would look like 10 months after graduation. I had this plan to justify staying in the states awhile, that I would save up to go to nursing school and then I could use that on the mission field... possibly India. And then that plan got destroyed in one conversation with Dr. Lightbody. Professor of the year? C'mon! hahahaha. "Rachel, " she said "Don't think you have to add to your resume' for God to use you." I was convicted to my core- that's totally what I was doing... I don't really want to be a nurse and even moreso after researching it. (For all the time and effort and money you would have to invest, you would really need to love it. Otherwise it's not sustainable.) So but I don't like that smoke screen being lifted because now I have no plan and that is scary to me.
I would like to end this paragraph with some resolution: "a note fell from the sky and told me to ..." or "...and then I met this awesome man who wants be a pastor in India...." or "... and then I found $5.00" but none of those are true. I guess this one's gonna end like an Indie film.
So I gots no man and I gots no plan... but I am doing alright. While I'm waiting for Hey Leonardo to put me in their music video.... I have another entertaining chiro story.
Yesterday my fave moment possible of all time on the 3rd floor of State and Elm- 2nd possibly only to when I asked him if it was safe to get an x-ray with my underwire bra on. So I always have trouble deciding how to get down from the table since I am laying on my stomach. Sometimes I slide off the edge. Sometimes I roll over and sit up. Can I just say that none of these are great choices? There should be a better way and I am determined to find it. So......Yesterday I decide to push my body up- pull my knees in and the climb off...are you picturing this? Dr. Hockey is standing at the head of the table looking at my chart and just as he looks up - I am on all 4 on top of the table! I am instantly amused and start laughing and he is completely frozen- unsure of what to look at or say. I dismount and gather my things while he tells me that 2x's next week will be good. Way to stick the landing, Rach! All I can say is: "Step aside Nadia Comaneci."
This just came to my email from my friend Dwight Edwards. What a guy! I thought it was appropriate given my post earlier.
ReplyDelete---------------------------------------------
Ours is not to decide when we will be most useful to God. As if we trafficked in that kind of omniscience in the first place. Ours is to “be ready”. The word Paul uses here was used in Greek literature to describe a soldier “staying at his post”. The soldier of Christ is to stay at his post, to simply remain doggedly faithful to the present task at hand. And then Paul adds the intriguing phrase “in season and out of season”. This probably has the thought of “when it is convenient and when it is inconvenient”. But it also points out a critical truth concerning usefulness and ministry.
Our calling is not to recognize the time of our usefulness, but to just keep showing up, showing up, showing up. Showing up to love God with all of our being. Showing up to love the brethren on good days and bad. Showing up to reach out into a needy broken world with the love of Christ regardless of how we think they will respond. Showing up for daily, routine, unglamorous faithfulness in our homes and at our jobs.
Someone has well said, “Satan doesn’t care what we do for God, as long as we do it tomorrow”. So, so true. And one of his most deceptive strategies is to get us focusing on our usefulness in the future so as to distract us from our usefulness in the now. That way myriads of opportunities for present impact are forfeited while we concern ourselves with how God is going to use us next. Fact is; none of us really has the foggiest idea how God is going to use us next. Far, far better to stay dialed in on this day, this hour, this moment. It is, after all, the only time frame our usefulness is truly guaranteed.