For so long, I was convinced I was going to go to VU and then transfer somewhere close to home. I love my friends and family so much, there seemed to be no other option for me. Until the beginning of this year. A good family friend told me about this Christian college called Indiana Wesleyan University. I had never heard of it before, but I decided to check it out. I fell in love. There was Scripture on very nearly every page of their website. Anytime I received mail from them, it would say that they were praying for me and my decision. When I visited campus, I loved the atmosphere, the look, the people, everything. I loved the little prayer chapel in the middle of campus, the lunch food, and the fair trade coffee shop in the student center. Although, I think the kicker was when I walked into their worship service and the band was singing "You Won't Relent" by Misty Edwards! (I might have freaked, just a little)
I completely felt God's call to attend college there. It was a perfect fit. Except for one thing, it's four hours away from Knox County. Not exactly what I had planned on. But, I still feel God's call to attend there (my mom and dad felt the same) so, a month ago, I officially enrolled at Indiana Wesleyan University. And I am really really excited! But can I let you in on a little secret that not many know about...
I'm really scared too.
I don't do well with "unknown." And pretty much everything about this college fits that category. I do not know any students, teachers, seriously anyone there. And that's scary for me. I'm leaving everything I have ever known and going to a place that allows me to come home probably no more than once a month. Move in day is three months from tomorrow, and let me tell you, it already feels like it's looming. And you know, it seems that when I face an unknown, my response is normally pretty consistent.
When I'm facing down "unknown", I start to cling to what I know.
When I don't know what's coming, what I've known for thirteen years starts to look pretty appealing. I want certainty. I want to know. That is most likely why God always leads me places where certainty is far out of reach.
Because God works best and shines brightest when we don't know all the answers.
"See I [God] am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland." Isaiah 43:19
Fear of "unknown" is not isolated to graduating seniors. "Unknown" springs up everywhere in our lives. I'm not sure what your "unknown" is, but I can pretty much guarantee that you have had one at one point or another. When we're facing our own personal "unknown", what we had before looks a lot better than it did when we were living in it.
But, see, God is doing a new thing! He is calling us out of what we know, out of comfort and certainty. Do we not perceive it? For this new thing has purpose! God is going to use your "unknown." For He is making a way in the wilderness. Making a way where? A way to The Way, Jesus. He is making streams in the wasteland. Streams of what? Living water. Streams where? In the wilderness of this world. God is using your "unknown" to further His kingdom. He is going to take you, like He took Abram (aka Abraham): take you from your homeland and everything you know, take you somewhere you don't even know, take you where you don't understand, and you are following on a promise. But that promise is enough. Because God ALWAYS keeps His promises. Always.
So may Abraham's example become our model. For God called... and he went. On simply a promise. A promise that was kept: descendents as numerous as the stars. He went, not because he knew where he was going, not because he had certainty, but because he "considered Him faithful who had made the promise" (Hebrews 11:11).
So it's not about knowing, about certainty. It's not about the promise itself, it's all about the Promise Maker. For when we know Him, we don't need to know anything else.
