Waiting in the Hallway

I’m scared of many things.

Bees are a big one. I hate ’em. As much as I like honey, I wish they would all just die. I’m also afraid of creepy-looking puppets, probably because I was exposed to about 5 of the worst minutes of the movie “Chuckie” when I was a young child and have been scarred ever since.

And anyone who knows me well knows that when there’s a storm approaching, I’m a wreck. Literally, I’m a totally different person when there’s thunder and lightning outside. I was one of those kids who would hide underneath a blanket and cry at the sound of every boom. When I was in high school, I was home alone one evening when my parents were out shopping, and of course a storm came. Knowing me so well, my mother called to make sure I was all right and tell me that they were on their way home, and I so bravely told her to hurry the heck up. (At the time I was sitting in the basement with the TV turned to the weather channel, the phone in one hand and a flashlight in the other…the power had not even gone out, by the way.)

Yeah…

Anyway, we all have our own phobias. For some it’s heights. For others it’s tight spaces. For my sister-in-law it’s spiders. But I think there’s one fear that seems to be wired into all of us.

The fear of not knowing what will happen next in our lives.

Am I right, or am I right? I mean in our culture, anyway, we have this overwhelming desire to plan our lives out, and often to plan it out way in advance. In middle school or high school you decide on what you want to be when you grow up (if you’re lucky and not like me), then you plan on going to college or into the workforce for whatever you want to be, and a few years later you will get married, then have kids and start a family, then you will keep doing whatever it is you want to do until you get to be 60, at which point you will retire and move to Florida with your significant other to bask in the sun ’til the end of your days.

We love planning, and we love to know what’s gonna happen next. Which brings me to my point…

What happens when we don’t know? What happens when (like me) we haven’t figured out what we want to do yet, so we can’t possibly know what will happen next? What happens when events occur that change our plans dramatically, whether they are welcome or not? It’s frightening to me to think about the future and honestly have absolutely no idea where I’m going to be a year from now.

If you’re anything like me, that verse in James 4 has always been a little unsettling: “Now listen, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go to this city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.’ Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.” (James 4:13-14)

Or maybe this one: “Therefore, do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” Easier said than done, right?

I’m gonna fill you in on a little personal secret of mine (don’t get excited, it’s not that big of a secret): As much as I’ve always been afraid of my plans for the future not working out or being changed in some way that I don’t want them to, I’m even more terrified of the fact that right now I don’t even have any plans. For a girl that likes to have everything in life figured out (which happens…never), this realization has continued to stress me out more and more as my college graduation date approaches nearer and nearer. I’ve spent nights laying in bed and staring at the ceiling just trying to think of something I have in mind that even slightly resembles a “life plan.” And so far, I’ve come up short.

So, although it’s difficult, I have tried to push the thought out of my mind and focus on what I’m doing right now, so as to prevent myself from having a total breakdown. But looming in the back of my mind remains the thought that I am totally unprepared for my future because I have no idea what to prepare for.

But what does it mean to be prepared for my future? According to my Bing search, a definition for prepared is “willing: willing and able to do something.”

What am I willing and able to do? I may not have a specific “something,” but I do know a few things about myself. The most important of those is this: That I believe in the God that declared, “For I know the plans I have for you…plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” (Jer. 29:11)

Although it’s not always as strong as I would like to admit, I have this beautiful (sometimes pesky) thing called faith–Faith in the God who has told me that He’s got it all figured out, and so long as I follow Him and trust Him, I will end up where I’m supposed to be. Is that not all the preparation I need?

We like to pretend we have it all figured out. We like to be able to tell people that we have a plan and intend on following it. For some reason, that gives us this huge sense of security and makes us feel like our lives are more put together than someone without a specific course of action. But although it feels good when we make plans, in my experience doing so makes it that much harder when those plans change.

So what am I saying? Don’t ever plan anything and just expect everything to work out for you without you having to think about it? No. That’s called being irresponsible. What I’m saying is that perhaps having a plan isn’t the bad thing, but remaining in the mindset that that plan is set in stone and not subject to change is. And if you don’t have a plan? Great. That’s fine. The plus side is that there will be less disappointment if whatever plan you could have wouldn’t have worked out. But don’t just carelessly let life pass you by and stop searching for what you could or should do next. Keep your eyes open.

There’s this great book called Mere Christianity by this awesome dude named C.S. Lewis (at least I’ve been told it’s good. I’m only on the third chapter, and it’s pretty great so far). I came across this quote, and although it’s not referring to exactly what I’m talking about here, I think it still applies pretty well. Here’s the scene: You’re in a hallway with many doors. You have many different choices on which one you should knock at (which direction you should go). See the connection? Ok, good.

“It is true that some people may find they have to wait in the hall for a considerable time, while others feel certain almost at once which door they must knock at. I do not know why there is this difference, but I am sure God keeps no one waiting unless He sees that it is good for him to wait. When you do get into the room you will find that the long wait has done some kind of good which you would not have had otherwise. But you must regard it as waiting, not as camping.”

So here I am. Waiting. Doing school, learning stuff I have an interest in, getting a job, spending time with family and friends, doing other things I love and still having no idea where I’m supposed to go with my life. I am waiting for God’s guidance. But I know that I will not wait forever, so I’m not going to make my camp here in this hallway as if I’m expecting to wait forever. I’m going to remain on my toes, listening and watching for that right door to appear for me so that when it does, I won’t miss it.

But still that fear creeps into my mind that even though I know that my right door will appear, I still don’t know where it will lead. Whenever this happens, I try to remind myself that I shouldn’t see this uncertainty as something to be scared of. I should see it as an adventure. What kind of adventure is life if you already know everything that’s gonna happen? A lame one. I’ve always wanted to go on an adventure. So I should be excited, because if I don’t know what’s going to happen next, that means that anything could happen. So until then, I will wait anxiously in this hallway so that I don’t waste my time on the wrong thing while my adventure passes me by.

And in the end, I know that this waiting will have done me good.

So how am I prepared for my future? I’m willing and able to wait for God to show me, in His timing, what’s next for me. After all, that’s the only preparation whose usefulness is a sure thing.