Friday 10 February 2012

New callings

Do you believe that your life can shift in major ways at any point in your life?

As I'm heading into my thirties, this is starting to be a concept that is fading further and further away. I am still tied to a generation (my parents) that was often educated and then worked in one job/field their whole lives. Marriage and children often came early, and then a settling into a very happy contented life that remained much the same year in and year out. My mom did go back to university in her thirties to become a teacher, but it was something that was always on her radar, a very natural step after a decade of raising her kids and volunteering in classrooms. To me as a ten-year-old girl, I still felt very little disruption in my life.

And so, now, as we find ourselves settling into a life pattern, I'm finding it more difficult to think that God could have major plans for me that don't in any way resemble what I'm doing now. Sure, there is a good chance that James grows our business, and perhaps does more writing as the business requires less of his hands on attention, but I find it hard to glance in our future and imagine something too different from what we are doing now.

And I think it could be a dangerous mind-set. Because I could be ignoring some important preparation now, or, worse, I could ignore and miss a fantastic opportunity for change and excitement in the future. Because it is possible that the road I could be led down is something that I would never fathom. Something I would never imagine myself doing. It is one thing to plan and dream your own ideas (and I sure do have many of those!) but even my own widest dreams could be minuscule compared to what God might have planned.

Maybe not. Maybe I will inspire in a quiet way from this beautiful little home and life I have right now. But I never want to miss a possibility because I'm too caught up in comfort.

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