My Story: Finding Purpose in the NOW

Recently, my life has been a whirlwind. Between classes at Durham Tech, homework, keeping up with home school classes, babysitting, several meetings in the Teen Arts Council at NCMA, church stuff, serving in the I58 ministry, finding time for friends, and struggling to find time to work on my portfolio, I’ve come to appreciate calendars. I basically live off of the calendar right now and have to plan out each day in order to get everything done. These things aren’t necessarily bad, but it’s hard to find purpose when you are basing your life on a checklist. I’m burnt out.

(Because every blogpost needs pictures, right? This is me and two of my beautiful friends who I finally got to see yesterday)

Whenever my life becomes this crazy, I tend to hope for the future and what it will bring. “Oh, I can’t wait for the day when I can go be an overseas missionary!” “Eventually I’ll find some way to use my gifts and talents for God.” “It will be awesome when I grow up and get married (no more single- pringle-ness) and even have a family of my own!” “Maybe my life will have purpose someday?” For some reason, I think that my life is meaningless right now. I’m just 16. I struggle with being bold. I struggle with not being able to go overseas yet. I struggle with figuring out how to use art and other talents I have to glorify God. I struggle with being single and basing my confidence on what guys think of me. Actually, I'm a people-pleaser, so I tend to struggle with basing my confidence on what anybody thinks of me (even if it's especially guys). I’m lusting for the future because for some reason I think that one day all of these problems that I’m facing will be gone.

With that being said, J.D Greear preached about purpose today and totally rocked my world. Each person has purpose. Purpose isn't just something that I may find one day. Not only that, but a lot of times, our greatest purpose is what God is doing in and through us and not what we are doing for Him! I dream about all of the awesome things I could be doing for him or can’t wait to do, and I forget about what He is doing in me. Where my life is at RIGHT NOW is important and necessary because it’s where God has placed me.

Despite the craziness, I've maintained my regular daily Bible study. Something that I've really been struggling with though, is how to apply what I read throughout the rest of the day. I have this mindset: “Show me what you want me to do now, God. Come on, I know you have to have SOMETHING!” No answer comes my way, and so I just keep on going with checking things off of my list. Occasionally, I’ll say a prayer to “bring God” into whatever I’m doing. Guess what? It hasn't been working.

The problem is that I have made God another check off of my list. If He doesn't have something else for me to do after my Bible study, well, that’s just too bad. Life is doing things, am I correct? That is what the world says. But with God, it’s different. Life is IN Him, Him in me, continually molding my character. No wonder I haven’t found purpose in what I am doing each day! God is literally the center of everything, and I have tried to make Him into a planet that orbits me (one of J.D’s analogies). My life will only be meaningful when I realize that what I DO will one day fade away; only eternal things will remain.

I’ll be honest with you, I’m still trying to decipher what exactly this will look like as far as application, but I’ll get back to you when I do. At least I know that where I am in my life RIGHT NOW is in fact important. I have something to anchor myself on that isn't based on circumstances, what I am doing/being needed, and even what people think of me. I can trust on the perfect God instead of the perfectionist and easily stressed out me. When we learn to trust God and take refuge in Him, we get to see Him working inside of us reforming our character. That’s how He Makes Us Beautiful.