“Never pray for patience. God will surely give you
situations in which to teach it to you.”
Kerri, my co-leader for small group told me that a couple
weeks ago. My question is, why didn’t someone share that nugget of wisdom with
me a year ago?!
A year ago, I was on my search for what I wanted from life.
Mainly, what kind of internship I was in search of. Those that know me, know
just how much I struggled to be patient with God. Some things however, have to
be taught as lessons to you for you to learn them.
“For there is
a time and a way for everything, although man's trouble lies heavy on him”
-Ecclesiastes 8:6
Have you ever seen Bruce Almighty with Jim Carrey? It’s
about a guy who gets fed up with how God is handling life and wants his own
control. God (Morgan Freeman) scares him and gives him that high and very
responsible heavy power. Now for those that have seen it, I want you to picture
the scene with Bruce at the computer answering all the prayers by email. He
eventually is so overwhelmed he answers “yes” to all of them.
That’s the God I was seeking. The one if I demanded enough
times to give me what I wanted it would happen. That God doesn’t exist. If you
remember how well it went for those people in the movie, you can appreciate how
terrible it would be if God really gave us everything we asked for. God knows
so much better than us. Aren’t we glad that God tells us no at times?
I slowly learned over the course of the summer the many reasons why God told
me no. The true irony didn’t become a factor until I interviewed with one of my
top companies Vanguard. Vanguard is an investment firm with a large office in
Charlotte, NC. With having almost zero background in finance (except for that internship over the summer), the firm didn’t
really make a fit for me but I was very interested in the company.
I went through three very successful interview rounds. My attitude
this time around was very different however. Instead of asking God for this
job, I was asking God if this job was for me. I prayed about the new location,
the people, the company itself, and my fit. I looked for confirmation factors starting
with the fact it was in one my top three cities, Fortune 500 company, ranked on
best places to work, company invests heavily into the employees, benefits were
great, I could go on. What really got my hopes up was that I knew many people
in Charlotte or moving to Charlotte and it had ELEVATION CHURCH! I’ve heard the
pastor speak before and heard such wonderful things about the church. I knew if
I couldn’t be near a NewSpring campus, I wanted to be near Elevation Church.(http://www.elevationchurch.org/)
However, you don’t get everything you want. At those moments, we are usually disappointed.
A lesson I had
really been learning and understanding. I think God recognized that I
really had been because I GOT THE VANGUARD JOB!!!
Let me be very clear. I got the job because of faith,
understanding, and hard work. I believed God would guide me in the right
direction, I understood that God’s plan was much better than ANYTHING I could
ever devise for myself, and I worked hard in school and preparing for those
interviews to be successful.
Each time I think about it, I get so excited and thank God.
I firmly believe that my financial internship (that I never would’ve pictured
having) was a clincher in getting this job. Funny how those things seem to work
out when God is involved.
It took me awhile but I finally got it:
"Trust in the Lord,
and do good; dwell in the land and befriend faithfulness. Delight yourself in
the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart"
-Psalm 37: 3-4
