This summer, Andrew and I got approved to do RUF, the university campus ministry of the PCA. During our final assessment meeting, we were given the stamp of approval, but we were also told not to put all our eggs in one basket. They told us that they would be evaluating what campuses would need ministers, but that we would need to wait patiently during the process.
Well...we have been waiting...since July....
We are excited about the future. Moving to a new place feels like an adventure. Andrew and I both are looking forward to being "the Shanks" somewhere new. Not just Andrew and Trish, still with our separate sets of social circles and obligations, like we are here. We can't wait to have a new home with space in the backyard for a garden and maybe some chickens. We are excited about having college kids in our home for Bible study and Wednesday night dinners.
But we haven't heard anything. Not a peep.
I am getting antsy. Not anxious antsy. Excited antsy. Can't wait to know where are going antsy.
Just the other week I was looking out my classroom window, thinking about the future, and admiring the bright red tree that sits close by. There was a little bluebird sitting on the end of a branch, looking out to the sky. It hopped around on the branches. It played with another bird. It was beautiful. It made my heart happy. As it flew away my mind was filled with a gentle reminder:
“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life? - Matthew 6: 25-27
Uh oh! Maybe I am not just antsy, maybe I am worried. Busted!
My worry was uncovered a few days later as Andrew and I were on a walk. As we talked RUF and the future, he mentioned how we would have to move in June to wherever we might be called. What? That soon? I panicked. My heart and my mind began to race. My true feelings about the future bubbled to the surface. We don't have very much money saved. We will have not had time to raise all the money we will need. What if there is a little Shank on the way? What if we don't like where we are going? What if they don't like us? What if, what if, what if?
Matthew 6...don't worry, your Father knows...
Maybe I am antsy because if I knew where we were going I could start looking for that house that has room for chickens and college kids. And we could start looking for our new church where we could be "the Shanks." If I knew where we were going I could at least start dreaming about it and planning for it.
Look at the birds...
Maybe it is a grace that we do not know yet. If I knew, perhaps my mind and my heart would begin to move on from Charlotte, from my friends, from our church, from my job. Maybe not knowing is a gift that allows me to continue being present here, to keep teaching, to keep investing, to keep living.
I don't want to check out mentally and fail to live fully in every moment of my last year of teaching at SouthLake- my students deserve better, my colleagues deserve better, the Lord deserves better. I don't want to spoil sweet times with friends because my gaze has moved from them to the future- These moments with them cannot be regained. I don't want my heart to move on, forgetting what is in front of me- There is so much now to be had.
I don't want to miss the now. I will keep looking at the birds.
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