Ruminations

My roommate and I were talking the other day about how what seems like a simple decision can influence the entire direction of your life for years to come. Here two years ago I decided, without too much thought, “I think I’ll work for Goldman.” Little did I know that it would take me to San Francisco for two years and end up being the most significant, character-shaping, life-changing experience of my life.

I definitely believe in free will. I believe that I decided—I, and not God—to take this job. But I believe that once I did, God’s amazing will went to work. I made a simple decision, and God set up everything else. From where I would end up living to where my cube was placed at work to what teams I got staffed on, God set it all in motion. All of it was planned the way it was to teach me lessons, to grow me as a person. I probably picked up 15% of what God wanted to teach me here. But never mind that, He will continue to try to teach me the lessons that I haven’t learned yet. That’s the result of having a God who is intimately concerned with His children’s development. “He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus” (Phil 1:6).

I found myself last night praising God for this job. No, that’s not a typo; I didn’t mean to write, “cursing.” I actually praised and thanked God for these past two years. These have been two phenomenal, significant, years. None have grown me as a person like these two. I will be forever grateful for this experience. It was hard, it was difficult, and I complained—a lot, and in fact will probably complain a few more times before it is officially over—but as I get prepared to leave, I realize just how good it was for me. As I’ve said before, I take away from this only the good, none of the bad. The bad is gone—or has turned into good. I am better for this experience. There, I said it. Scary, huh?

And now I’m onto better things. Exciting things. There was a point a while back when I doubted my whole decision. After all, if I have learned this much after two years, wouldn’t another year be even more significant? It was after thinking this that another thought popped into my head—I’d like to think it was “Divine Intervention”—that asked “do you really want to just exist for another year?” And that’s what I’d be doing in this job—existing. Not living. Just existing.

There’s a profound difference in the two. I would argue that a lot of people out there, not just in my company, but all over, that are merely existing through life. I like Thoreau’s quote, “the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.” If that isn’t a description of corporate America, I don’t know what is.

I have come to believe—perhaps errantly, in which case I’m sure God will teach me otherwise at some point over the next three years—that God wants all of us to live, to thrive. I cling to Psalm 37:4, “delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart.” That verse, coupled with Proverbs 3:5, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding” paints a revolutionary outlook on life. I take it to mean that God has given us desires—passions—that He wants us to fulfill. We find out those passions by growing closer to Him. And if God puts something on our heart, even if it doesn’t make sense, He wants us to fulfill it. If we then trust in God to provide—leaning not on our understanding—He will provide.

So many of us have desires and passions in life. And yet we take them to be nothing more than pipe dreams; logically, we can’t figure out how we can support ourselves (or a family) by fulfilling them. So we give up on them. But I believe that the Christian whose will is aligned with God’s can and should fulfill these passions, confident that the God who will never leave us or forsake us will provide. He may do it in one of His characteristic “mysterious ways” perhaps asking us to sacrifice our dream (think Abraham and Isaac) before we can fully realize it. And like Abraham, we must be willing to sacrifice it all, without any thought of a “Plan B” (Abraham brought no lamb to the altar, only his son) trusting in the Lord who Provides.

Like I said, do not quote me on this—yet. These are ruminations, scattered thoughts now. I need more study and more devotion to find out if they are of God or simply the ramblings of a 24 year old who has had a lot of time by himself the past two years to think. And I want to emphasize that I am not preaching the prosperity Gospel here. I am preaching the Gospel of a God who tells us not to worry about what we shall eat or the clothes that we wear. And I’m not talking about Morton’s steak house and Burberry scarves. I’m talking about the necessities of life, the basics.

I would have never thought two years ago I would have ended up where I am. Strangely, that gives me comfort in my next three (or four, or five). Look how much God was able to do with my simple decision made rather hastily. “I think I’ll work for Goldman.” I’m beginning to wonder if it really matters to God what we choose to do. If maybe He’s waiting up there in Heaven saying, “OK, Chris, decide whatever you’re going to do, but for My sake, hurry up already. I got a lot to teach you and a lot to throw your way, and I need to know whether I should send my angels to La Mirada or if they should hop the 57 to Azusa.”

Maybe (just maybe) I’m onto something.

Or maybe I simply have too much time on my hands these days.