Purpose

We were not created for what is safe, or what is comfortable. Though it is often tempting to take that way, that is not where our greatest joy is to be found, because we are not living in the capacity we were created for. This thought has brought me great joy as I stand at the front end of this incredible journey that God has laid out before me. I am so excited to live in the capacity for which He created me and experience the life and joy that is to be found in doing so.

This thought also reminds me of something I heard at a conference once when I was in college. The theme was Revel, and we spent much of the weekend talking about what it means to revel, and what are we meant to revel in. The speaker said pretty early on in the weekend that as he has worked with college students for years, the thing he has noticed is that everyone he meets seems to be reveling in things far too small. You are reveling in things far too small. This reality has echoed in my head over and over again since that weekend, as I find myself tempted to settle for what I am doing and believing the lie that "there is nothing more I can do."

One story the speaker used was from Donald Miller's book, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years. It was about an average family, and in this family there was a girl who had always been a very good child growing up, and hadn't caused many problems. As she grew older, she began dating this boy whom her parents were very concerned about, and began being exposed to drugs and alcohol through her time with him. To no avail, they tried to stop this relationship. In the end, her father ended up taking a drastic step, putting money in to help build and open a school/orphanage in Africa. Once she was able to participate in this, she quickly left the boyfriend behind to get on board with this story. 

The point Miller is making here is that she was simply choosing the most easily available better story. She wasn't finding excitement or fulfillment in the mundane life she was living so she tried to make her's a better story by bringing this boy and the things that came along with into her story. But it wasn't her dream, it was simply the most easily available story that was better than the one she was living. 

We weren't made for the most easily available. We were made for bigger, for more extraordinary, for that which we cannot rely on ourselves, but only the One who has been writing our story from the beginning of time. And His is the best story. That's the one I want my life to be a part of.