It's been seven weeks.
I never thought I'd survive this long, but here I am, typing away, seven weeks later.
So I guess I was wrong.
I was wrong about a lot of things.
See, I didn't know that dreams could break your heart.
But they can.
"Maybe..you're not supposed to go to college this year."
I felt sick. I felt a feeling that I had never had before, sinking a hole into my stomach.
Not go to college? I've been working to go to college for almost ten years.
It didn't help that all my friends were leaving in bunches to go to the schools I wanted to go to.
I applied to ten colleges.
I had the grades.
I had the scholarships.
But I didn't have the direction.
I had prayed ceaselessly that God would show me where I was supposed to be, and I thought for sure that this school in Missouri, the one where I could graduate debt free, was where I was supposed to be. And then, I got the letter that said I was wait-listed. I remember sitting outside of the store in the car, all alone. I held the letter in my lap, and then I remembered.
God, I will praise you if I get accepted or not.
And right there, I praised him.
And then the weeks went on, and I kept praying, and everyone else around me was making their decisions, and I still didn't know. I felt helpless, but at the same time, had peace.
I knew that if God wanted me to go to college and I was seeking him, I wasn't going to miss it. I had done my best, and the rest was up to God.
I had this idea in my mind that God was going to "come through" at the last possible moment.
And so, when I arrived home in August from Chicago, I was...
Well,
I was lost.
I've always known where I was supposed to be. I've always tried to follow the Lord, and I had surrendered every college to him. At that point I was ready to go to any college he wanted me at. But I hadn't surrendered college itself. And I just figured that God "coming through" meant that he would fulfill that desire of my heart.
It would be so easy for me to become bitter, to say, "God, you didn't come through for me!"
But that isn't true. He has come through for me. In my deepest heartbreak, he walks beside me and carries me. He gives me strength and opens new doors that I couldn't have foreseen for myself.
For the first time in my life, I have complete charge of my time. I don't have the pressure of grades or test deadlines or work, and I'm free to try new things, right where I'm at.
God came through,
not how I wanted him to,
but in a way that was best for me.
And so, as I brave life in a form that I've never seen before, I praise him, because he is growing me and taking me on adventures that are making me into someone he can use to advance his kingdom.
Seven weeks later,
Here.
I.
Am.
