Seriously, that has to be the most asked and the most unanswered (or the most lied about) question asked of us college students.
1st Question: “What school do you go to?”
You’re either proud of this question, or ashamed of this question. Or you just don’t care; it’s a means to an end, and it hasn’t really made a directional impact on you yet. If you’re at community college, you’re either floating or you’re trying to get OUT. If you’re at a private school, either your parents sent you there or you’re sold on it. If it’s a state school, you’re either in love with the school, you’re there for a set purpose and that purpose only, or both…or it’s just cheaper. The last two options involve substantial amounts of debt you’re not sure how you’re going to pay off in your lifetime.
2nd Question: “What is your major?”
Most of us stumble over that one. We say right. Then we say left. We say sideways. We say straight. Truth is, either it’s already been decided for us, or we haven’t got a clue which way is up. All we know is that degree = job…and even that’s not certain anymore.
3rd Question: “What do you think you’ll do with that?”
» Translates: “How are you going to make money, and how much of it are you going to make?”
Wow, what a loaded question. Most of us are just proud of the fact that we finally have a major, and want you to congratulate us on our belabored decision. Or we’re in the process of learning as much more about our major as we can—something that can only really be done in a college setting or in an internship. Some people go to college knowing exactly what they want to do—what they’ve wanted to do since kindergarten. But the majority of us start with an interest, and move from there. Most of us have many interests, and are not sure which one we’re okay with doing and stressing out over for the rest of our lives. It’s why determining our major is so difficult. We don’t know what we’re doing with it; that’s what we’re in college to learn!
It’s so much pressure! Especially if we want to have a job that we actually enjoy and are good at. Sadly, for a growing number of people, this is not the case. People just want food on the table and money in their pockets.
People don’t want to learn anymore. They just want to make money.
They don’t realize that they’re setting a course for nowhere. Living to survive isn’t really living. I can say that, because at least on a psychological level, that was what I did for at least 10 years of my life. There are color and emotion in the world for a reason.
I just hope we don’t all get so caught up in day-to-day survival that we can’t see it.
Does your relationship with God ever feel like phone tag? Do you mean that you don’t get answers right away?
I think part of having a relationship with God is realizing that it really isn’t dependent on your feelings; it’s dependent on God’s faithfulness and love, which never change.
That being said, sometimes our relationships with God are like that. Sometimes, in our day-to-day life, God seems very very small—like He has little to no part in our lives. But realize this: Just because you can’t “feel” Him there, doesn’t mean He actually isn’t. Oftentimes we as Christians feel closest to God in the middle of the raging part of storms and trials, where all we can see is God because He’s the only thing that’s solid, the only thing we can depend on. It’s been said that Christians who have been persecuted, jailed, and tortured for their faith long for a return to those very jail cells afterward, because that is where they felt truly close to God. But not all of life is like that. Not all of life is jail cells and dying, especially in America. For us, the struggle is to realize that God actually is moving in our lives, even when we don’t see Him.
You want to get close to God. I tell you, He already is close to you. You just don’t notice the floor that you’re standing on, and the reason you don’t fall down. In reading your Bible, realize that God comes to you now not as a cloud of smoke or as a flame of fire—not because He is afar off from you, but because He is so close that those demonstrations are unnecessary.
Do you want to know why I feel close to God? I look around me, and realize that every molecule in every grain of wood is held together by Him, that every cell and atom in my body is inexplicably held together by Him (when every law of physics says it should fly apart), that every breath of air I breathe is because He has given it to me; that I live where I live and I go to school where I go to school because He has a plan for me to be there; that things I have waited for all my life, have not been given to me, because it is not His right timing; that every person who crosses my path is put there intentionally by God, and I am put intentionally in their lives by God; that Jesus is my lifeblood, and without Him I would have no reason to live. I realize that I am completely in His more-than-capable hands, completely at His mercy, and I LOVE BEING THERE. There is nowhere else I would rather be. And I am so convinced of this irrefutable dependency on Him, that I cannot deny Him, because in denying Him I would be denying my very own existence.
Now take a moment, sit back, and look over what I just wrote. I never said that God was physically standing right behind me. I never said that all my prayers were answered with a “yes and amen.” Do you know what “amen” means? In essence, it means, “Your will be done.” It’s a submission statement.
That being said about submission, you must realize that you are not just a slave. A bond-servant of Christ, yes. But Christ has also called you “brother” and “friend.” A master does not have to tell his servant what he is doing. But he may choose to tell his friend (see John 15:15). In Genesis, speaking about Abraham to His accompanying angels as He walked the earth, Jesus said, “Shall I keep/hide this from him?” (Genesis 18:17) and then He proceeds to tell Abraham that He is on earth to investigate the outcries to heaven and decide whether to destroy the city. In doing so, He knowingly allows an opportunity to beg Him on the city’s behalf. Moses’s story is similar, when Moses goes to Mount Sinai and God tells him He is going to wipe out all the people and make Moses into His nation instead (Exodus 32:10). He is perfectly just in doing so, and does not by any means ask Moses’s permission. But in telling Moses, He knowingly allows for Moses to plea on behalf of the people.
I think part of having a relationship with God, is realizing that He actually doesn’t have to say anything.
I just thought of something, a theory I’ve kept close to my heart that I want to share with you. Every person is distinct and different, both in their character traits and in their flaws. What makes them unique is that combination of their perfections, their imperfections, and the life that they choose to lead (events, and how they choose to deal with them). This forms their character in a way that cannot be replicated, even if you were to clone the person. Now. If you were to fall in love with a person, it is likely the little things that would endear you to them. Because to you, those little things stacked up just the right way are what make up them. In the same way, it’s the little things about God that make up His character. It’s why the book “The Knowledge of the Holy” is one of my favorites. But even “The Knowledge of the Holy” takes it in much too big of chunks—leaps, per say—if you don’t know the little details, the little stories. You can say, “Yeah, Jesus turned water into wine!” (from John 2) Conclusions you might reach from that are, “He had compassion on the people at the wedding,” or “It was just another miracle; He was doing what He was meant to do.” But look at how He treats the people in the process, how He grows their faith, how He engages them and asks them questions, how He says “It’s not time” but He does it anyway. What does this tell you about Him? If you saw this firsthand, what would you think of His character?
Where I was going about that statement about people and perfection and flaws, is that the very thing that makes God unique, is that He HAS NO FLAWS. I know you already know this in your head, but think about this for a moment. When you read a book, often the main hero (or other central character) has a tragic flaw, which makes you both berate and mourn their foolishness simultaneously. The reason it tugs at your heart strings, is that every person in real life has a tragic flaw like that. It’s just that everybody’s tragic flaw works differently. But God—Jesus doesn’t have any tragic flaws. And that trait makes Him unique. It’s one of those little things to fall in love with…one of those little-BIG things.
You can’t love someone without being close to them in your heart; physical proximity has nothing to do with it. And the way you learn about someone you’re interested in, is you take note of all the little details. What do they think about this? How do they respond to that? It’s those little building blocks that teach you to love someone not just for who they’re supposed to be, but to love someone for who they are.
The image I always keep close to my heart, is when all the disciples want to know who’s going to betray Jesus, so they ask John, and John leans back against Jesus’s chest in the most intimate position ever, and Jesus accepts him and answers him (John 13:23-6). “The Disciple Whom Jesus Loved”—John is so secure in His love, in His closeness, that he can declare this of himself in the midst of all the other disciples, and even show such an intimate example. That picture of John reclining back into Jesus—that is where I want to be.
[Taken from a personal email to a fellow author and brother in Christ; slightly revised for confidentiality purposes.]
I’m thinking about majoring in Creative Writing. Creative Writing has been an interest and hobby of mine for many years.
Most children grow out of their imaginations, or either choose to or are forced to put their imagination on the backburner. But I valued my imagination even as a child. I was an avid reader, seeing books as journeys and adventures taking me far from home. As I grew older, and my friends’ tastes for playing pretend began to fade away to dreams of distant celebrities, I began to write stories of my own. I always created vast plotlines when I played either alone or with a friend, taking these plotlines very seriously, always remembering them, planning them, and picking up where I left off. As I grew older, I began translating these ideas into the written word, remembering the writing styles of the many novels I read and now crafting my own.
In fifth grade I began handwriting a story about a girl my age and her friends stumbling into a fantasy land. I sat down with a pen and a nondescript spiralbound notebook, and began to write about all the characters and ideas that popped into my head. Soon I ran out of room in the notebook and wrote on the backs of pages, numbering the pages, and eventually moved on to the next notebook. One notebook turned into six notebooks, and I moved on to the next book in my series. Other people asked me why I always carried a notebook and what I wrote, and slowly I opened up and let them read my work. They read, and when they caught up to where I was writing, they asked where the rest of the story was. When I read my story aloud to my mom, she asked about the rest of the story when I stopped reading. I told her I hadn’t written it yet. Startled, she told me she had forgotten I wasn’t reading her a finished book.
Whether letter or fiction, people have always described my work as making them feel that they are really there—there with me in a foreign land, or there with the characters as part of their impossible adventure. I have always been shy of showing my work to people I know. But over the years I found that even in venting my darkest of thoughts into literature, my work brings intensity and enjoyment to others, and makes their day a little brighter…or at least, makes life a little more interesting.
