"Eh, they say hind sight is 20/20. Well, they're right. It's behind me.
Back for the third time - you know where to find me!
Hanging on the coat tail of Christ, who designed me -
Keep me off your brain. In other words, don't mind me. ...
"We ain't in a dream world. We're spitting that real life.
We live in the real world, and know just what it feels like.
So we're pressing in like steel spikes.
To stand in a fallen world, it don't feel nice.
Eh, even if you're rich or you've got a lot of cash,
You're still not exempt as everybody's on the map.
We all feel the pressure, heavy burdens on our backs -
Every day, it's still hard, but we're learning like it's class."
- Trip Lee.
My Easter weekend and week was interesting. My host from the Philippines came into town for a few days during his whirlwind tour of the US, between the end of his semester in law school and his graduation. We went to some extra services with my church's host church for Holy Week. It was good to see everyone there and more passionate than they usually are. On Saturday, we had a Bible study that went late into the night. Many people who attended the Bible study didn't sleep that night because we had a sunrise service for Easter.
I decided to skip the sunrise service because my still-recurring headaches and jaw pain have given me tremendous trouble sleeping and I was not sure how much sleep I would actually get during the last few hours of Saturday night. Despite trying many kinds of treatments and sleeping arrangements, I slept through the night only once during a whole month. During the day, I usually have a dull headache that gets worse as the day goes on, occasionally stabbing pains, pains that shoot around my whole jaw, and popping ears. It's bad. Theologically correct or not, I've told some people that everyone in hell has this condition.
So I woke up about an hour later and went to the church that I had visited last Easter. It was great to be in the presence of almost 4000 other Christians who were passionately worshiping the one true God through songs that echoed Biblical truth. It felt like going to a conference again. After the service, I loaded up on books and spent time with a college friend who I had not seen since I visited the same church a year prior.
We shared prayer requests. I asked him to pray for my career situation, specifically mentioning that I have a desire to do full-time missions in the Philippines but no definite calling on whether I should stay here or drop everything and go there. He said he would pray for it.
The next day was Monday. I was back at work. During two-plus months of this pain, I had not even taken one day off from work, though I've had three emergency dental visits in the last three weeks. The morning went like a usual morning, with a few meetings. I let my boss know that I would need to step out in the afternoon for a dental appointment. He was fine with it. I started eating lunch at my desk, while still working, while my office mates were out on their lunch break. I started hearing rumblings about some "1:00 meeting" which I had figured was for a specific project that some others on the team were working on.
Then 1:00 came. In the middle of lunch, my boss called me into the HR office. They told me that my performance had not improved enough since my review in January (although all marks on that review were officially good) and I could not work there anymore. They were seeing my pain as an excuse rather than the root cause why my performance had not improved. I explained this, but didn't bother to try fighting to keep my job.
I've really been wrestling with whether I should make this post public but anonymous on my blog or private for my Facebook friends. This is not the first time I have lost my job. Actually, it's the third. The first two times, I was laid off for circumstances that were not my fault. This time, it is officially my fault, though I think others should at least share some blame for it. But I hate going to church and hearing "How's your job search?" instead of "Hi, how are you?" from so many of my friends. So I've only told a few of them.
I'm also not sure whether or not I should try to fight to stay in this line of work or not. The last place made me, occasionally, legitimately hate what I was doing for a living. I have several choices now. One is to look for another job - not preferable, but I'm starting to put feelers out anyway. One is to start freelancing in hopes that it will get successful and I'll be able to live in the Philippines and keep doing it in the future. One is to do paid work with a nonprofit or charity. One is to become a missionary to the Philippines - and anyone who has read this blog long enough would know that I have a specific burden for that country.
During the past two weeks, I've mostly just been sleeping a lot. I hope it is not laziness, but rather a legitimate need to rest after the pain had kept me awake every night for a month. The pain has subsided to the point where I can function now, though my ears are still popping. I've been staying in my house for several days at a time and rarely going out anywhere. It feels like being a hermit.
My relationship with God has seemed distant since Easter. Due to the pain, I haven't fasted recently; I will try to fast again soon. And most days, I've woken up and gone straight to my computer to do research for this job hunt / career change / whatever this is going to be. I've barely prayed about it at all and have barely been in the Word. You can have a theology blog, be registered to attend another conference in a month, and have a relationship with God that is barely there at all. I feel ready to worship, but without spending much time with Him - it seems more accurate that I am ready to let out emotion for emotion's sake and call it worship.
A question that keeps coming back to me is: If I stay in this line of work, does that show a lack of faith? If I stay in America, does it show a lack of faith? If I start another job that gives me only two weeks a year of vacation (standard in the US), I won't be able to go back to the Philippines until the end of 2013 - if the trip gets approved again.
On the other hand, a friend who is a missionary tweeted earlier this morning encouraging believers to sell all for Christ now. Another friend who is leaving for South America as a full-time missionary in the summer told me that a trend in his missions organization is to be an expatriate worker. That is how a lot of missions to the unreached is being done. I know several people who expatriated to the Philippines, though their reasons were related more to work than to missions. There also seems to be a lot of options to teach at schools for missionary kids there, but that seems more like just supporting missions to me rather than being on the front lines.
I know my family wants me to stay in the corporate world, despite my failure there so far. They don't want me to go and stay in the Philippines. To many Americans, success equals success in the corporate arena. To many Filipinos, the same is true.
I hope that whatever decision I make is legitimately surrendered to God and not based on unbelief or fear. On the way home from work two Mondays ago, I was not crying or screaming at God as I had been after both of my layoffs in previous years. I was peacefully surrendered to whatever God has for me next - holding my career and ambitions with an open hand and telling Him that I wanted Him to do what He wanted with it. That's probably the most peace I have had in a while about my direction in life.
Surrender to God must not be a flash in the pan, decided in the moment and then forgotten about. Whoever leaves anything or anyone for the sake of Christ will receive their reward in eternity:
"Then Peter said to Him, 'Behold, we have left everything and followed You; what then will there be for us?' And Jesus said to them, 'Truly I say to you, that you who have followed Me, in the regeneration when the Son of Man will sit on His glorious throne, you also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or farms for My name’s sake, will receive many times as much, and will inherit eternal life. But many who are first will be last; and the last, first.'" (Matthew 19:27-30)
My copy of Let the Nations Be Glad arrived a few days ago. I have read only a few pages in the preface so far and have tried to really dwell on what is being said:
"All the earth-shaking awesome forces unleashed on the world are released by the Lord Jesus Christ. He reigns today. He is in the control room of the universe. He is the only Ultimate Cause; all the sins of man and machinations of Satan ultimately have to enhance the glory and kingdom of our Saviour. This is true of our world today - in wars, famines, earthquakes, or the evil that apparently has the ascendancy. We have become too enemy-conscious, and can over-do the spiritual warfare aspect of intercession. We need to be more God-conscious, so that we can laugh the laugh of faith knowing that we have power over all the power of the enemy (Luke 10:19). He has already lost control because of Calvary where the Lamb was slain. What confidence and rest of heart this gives us as we face a world in turmoil and such spiritual need."
- Patrick Johnstone, Operation World.
Regardless of how we choose to promote Him, we must promote Him. The Lamb will receive the full reward of His suffering. Don't we want to be used in that great cause?
"9 After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could count, from every nation and all tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, and palm branches were in their hands; 10 and they cry out with a loud voice, saying,
“Salvation to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb.” 11 And all the angels were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures; and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, 12 saying,
“Amen, blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might, be to our God forever and ever. Amen.”
13 Then one of the elders answered, saying to me, “These who are clothed in the white robes, who are they, and where have they come from?” 14 I said to him, “My lord, you know.” And he said to me, “These are the ones who come out of the great tribulation, and they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. 15 For this reason, they are before the throne of God; and they serve Him day and night in His temple; and He who sits on the throne will spread His tabernacle over them. 16 They will hunger no longer, nor thirst anymore; nor will the sun beat down on them, nor any heat; 17 for the Lamb in the center of the throne will be their shepherd, and will guide them to springs of the water of life; and God will wipe every tear from their eyes.”"
- Revelation 7:9-17.
Sunday is only a shadow.
