This is by no means my first blog. That was a fun place over at LiveJournal, where to this day, the interface is how I set it to be. (You can learn from that, Facebook! Changing things every few months. It's annoying. Don't fix what ain't broke.)
Anyway, when Google started taking over the world, I started a blog on Blogger named after a song by Bebo Norman. I didn't blog too much since those were the awesomely wonder years of college where I was having too much fun in real life to blog. (Not that I'm not having fun in real life now. It's different!) :] Since all the blogs you own or are a part of show up in your Blogger dashboard, I saw that old blog and browsed through it. Nothing terribly interesting until I came upon a post I posted on January 3, 2007. I had just attended Urbana '06, a giant Christian conference aimed at college students that only occurred every three years.
This was the post:
Wednesday, January 03, 2007
Many went to Urbana expecting to be told by God what they are to do with their lives.
I received my calling at Urbana '06.
I did not expect thunder and lightning to reveal a moment of revelation.
He did not give it to me.
I had no expectations for Urbana '06.
Yet God exceeded them.
He answered unprayed prayers.
He spoke to me.
He did not tell me what to go to grad school for.
He did not tell me what my career, if I have one, will be like.
He did not tell me who I am going to marry.
He did not tell me whether I will get into grad school.
He did not tell me whether I will get a job.
But He did tell me what my calling is in life, which is to live for Him.
Anything else is really secondary.
"Live a life worthy of the calling." ~ Ephesians 4:1
I received my calling at Urbana '06.
I did not expect thunder and lightning to reveal a moment of revelation.
He did not give it to me.
I had no expectations for Urbana '06.
Yet God exceeded them.
He answered unprayed prayers.
He spoke to me.
He did not tell me what to go to grad school for.
He did not tell me what my career, if I have one, will be like.
He did not tell me who I am going to marry.
He did not tell me whether I will get into grad school.
He did not tell me whether I will get a job.
But He did tell me what my calling is in life, which is to live for Him.
Anything else is really secondary.
"Live a life worthy of the calling." ~ Ephesians 4:1
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As I read that today, I kinda blinked and then smiled cause... WOW. I went to grad school, I got married, and I have a job. Hindsight is always, of course, more interesting, and to stand on "the other side" looking back on what I didn't know... all sort of coming to pass since then. But the greatest reminder which I often forget... is that back then... I "figured out" what my calling is in life -- to live a life worthy of the calling. Something solid in the fluidity of the unknown. Is it better to know that and not all the stuff I know now? Probably. But I should make something of that --- to know all those uncertainties back then... and to live a life worthy of the calling. Of course there will be all sorts of other things I don't know now that will make sense later. :]
Blogs are kind of fun to look back on and go "what was I thinking?!" but also to see how far and how much we've grown. The things we've learned. Our experiences. Those raw in-the-moment emotions we went through. In a 3 page blog post. (Oh I know you have those! :oP)
I'm gonna go think some more about this while I cook dinner. Maybe.
Do you ever go back on old blog posts? Or {gasp} those things called journals with the paper where used a pen...?
that's kinda cool to go back and see what you had before! and to see how God made it all work out. I hate re-reading old things I've written because it usually makes me cringe at how whiny or dramatic i was being at the time. >.>"
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