When Jackson was a baby, I would hop into my car on my lunch break and rush to his day care to see him. I had thirty minutes with my baby and I needed every last second. I was a mess of a new mom and had a really hard time leaving him everyday. I was caught in the conundrum of loving teaching with all that I was and loving being a mom desperately wanting to stay home. I established a neat relationship with Jack's care-takers. They were a little older than me and much wiser. They will never fully know how appreciative I am for their advice and comfort during those beginning moments as a mama. When I decided to leave my teaching career and move halfway across the country to do so, they gave me a piece of advice that I didn't take seriously initially but now hold dear. They told me I had to find something for me. They watched me finish my master's that year and knew I was the type that needed to be doing. They recognized that I was about to enter a season where I had to hold
"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "Plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future." Jeremiah 29:11 We Christians like this verse; like A LOT. We have it written all over the place. We hang this verse up in our home and tattoo it to our bodies. Jeremiah 29:11 is everyone's life verse. I mean, who doesn't want to rest in knowing the God has a plan for our life; especially when that plan includes safety and prosperity. Even if I didn't believe in God, I would hold onto this verse. What if, however, we have been misinterpreting this verse all these years? This life, the here and the now, we like it. Well, some of us probably want to throw this life in the trash like a rough draft and have a do-over. But, for the most part, we hold onto this life for dear life. It is all we know. It can be scary to think of anything else. Because of this, we go all in even when the cards we are dealt are bad. Thi