Life Preparation 101

I like to be prepared. I fluctuate between being a person who is over prepared or a person who did not prepare at all. But at my core, I like to be prepared. I also don't like to fail. I dread being put in a situation that I don't feel prepared for because I might fail.

Having been home schooled, I always wonder if I am as prepared as they are. I fluctuate between feeling silly pride that I am better schooled or prepared than the average joe, and abject terror that I am not at all schooled or prepared.

I have been graduated from high school for two years. Still the question looms. Am I prepared? What is being prepared? What am I preparing for? Am I too focused on the future to realize that my life is happening today? I am not in college, I don't know of anything that I want from college. Two years ago, I was terrified of college but I can honestly say that fear is not what kept me from going. I didn't, and don't believe that college is the way God would have me prepare.

In the past two years, I have alternately taken and lead a discipleship course. I have been at home on and off as well. I found out that my being able to sleep twelve to fourteen hours a day is not normal and was on bed rest for a month. My relationship with God has been rebuilt almost from square one. I had a part time job at a horse barn. I found out that I want to own sheep.

So, if college is not the way God lead me to prepare does that mean that the way He has lead me is preparation? I can tell you very specifically what I want to do with my life. Simply put, I want to be a mother to troubled children, but there are many more details that God has given me. He has given me a dream. In America, when you have a dream you make a to-do list of how you are going to accomplish your dream.

My dream is different. My dream is a gift from God, and as a gift He has told me that He will accomplish it. It is a lot like giving someone the picture of the gift you had in mind for them because it is still in the mail. You don't give someone a picture of the 'gift' and then tell them to buy it themselves with their own money.

As I was pondering this I found that it is a very biblical concept, this giving a dream as promise of a future gift. Joseph was told that he would rule over his family and he became a slave and was sent to jail. Moses was groomed to be an Egyptian prince and became a convict and a sheep herder before he became the leader of his nation. David was anointed as king and went right back to doing odd jobs at home.

I don't see anything in these stories that would be recognized as life preparation except by the eyes of faith. I happen to have a pair of Eyes of Faith and they tell me a surprising story. God uses day to day life as preparation. I've had a lot of daily days, and to believe by faith that I am prepared for tomorrow is relieving.

"If God is for us, who [and what] can be against us?" Romans 8:31