Desert Song

"All of my life, in every season, you are still God, I have a reason to sing...."

-from Desert Song by Hillsong United

Christian and I are both in our last semester of graduate school, and we are faced with many choices about our future.  We are no different from many people our age....we are wandering through the desert of life, wishing that God would speak to us, like he did Moses, and tell us exactly what to do. However, I am daily working to embrace the conviction I have had in the past weeks: it doesn't matter.  No matter what our future holds, the fact remains that we are blessed right here, right now, and, in every season, God's love is enough.  

Two things happened this weekend, which both humbled me and further convicted me of this truth.  A cab picked me up bright and early at 5:15 AM on Friday morning to take me to the airport.  My cab driver, a slight man with a dark, wrinkled face and kind eyes, told me about his humble beginnings.  At the young age of 16, a family friend drove him from Mexico to Austin, and he was left to fend for himself, with $1.oo in his pocket.  He spoke no English, had no friends, and certainly had no means of getting either of those things.  God must have been looking out for this man, because the very first person he approached not only gave him a job, but also paid for him to learn English.  He ended up working for this "stranger" for 20 years, and he eventually married an Austinite and raised 3 children with her.  Don't tell me that God didn't plan that. 

Even more touching than this man's story was a story that I heard at Stream in the Desert this weekend.  A highly successful family from Rowanda was forced to flee to America, barely escaping death.  Do you think that that was in their plans?  To drag their five children to a foreign country?  To give up a high paying job to become a custodian at a hospital?  To leave behind their friends and family, only to find that those most precious to them had been slaughtered?  God forgive me for not being content with the life you have given me.  I am blessed beyond measure.

So things may not work out the way that we plan them.  So what. If I'm really honest with myself, it is simply my own pride and desire to impress the world that drives my desire to see my plans come to fruition.  I have to know....I HAVE TO know....that God has a purpose for my life that far exceeds the one I have for myself. Lord help us all remember that in every season, regardless of circumstances, you are worthy of honor and praise.