THE NOW AND THE NOT YET.

Regardless what we were taught as kids growing up in the 90′s, you just can’t always be what it is you want to be. It is not true. It is not a question of how much you believe or how hard you work (although who you know is of some use). The simple reality is, sometimes hard work and determination just don’t pay off.

I have been a little flaky for the last year or two when people ask me what it is that I want to be, or where it is I want to go. I honestly just don’t know how to answer that question.

The truth is what I want to be is a missionary. That is where my heart is at. I think that is where I would “flourish” as my friend says. I also think that is where my wife would “flourish.” I would love to see Jules grow up in that environment.

The reality is, that just doesn’t seem to be possible for my family. The last few years have left me shaky on the exact way to word such things. I am not sure if “it isn’t God’s will” or “God has something bigger planned for me and my family” or “our faith wasn’t big enough” or “we had too much unconfessed sin in our lives and weren’t holy enough” or which particular theological thicket to ascribe to on the matter. All I know is we were willing + ready + able. We pushed forward and began all the processes. We started raising money. In the end we just didn’t succeed. Maybe God’s kingdom is as simple as that. Sometimes things work and sometimes they don’t, and you just keep moving forward one way or another.

What I do know is that we had to start over. It is no small thing to give up a career to go into missions. It might seem risky to do so after a great number of years of service, but I think it is more risky to do so after a few short years. Employers see your resume and think, “if I hire this person, they’re just going to split as soon as something better comes along.”

What I managed to salvage from failing as a missionary was a possible career as a teacher. I have rounded the halfway mark of my second year. Where I find myself now is having to pretend to care about a lot of things. It is a painful business having to pretend to care about something. Sure, I can do the daytime part of teaching history fairly simply. I like history, and I like working with students. That is the easy part. The difficult part is all the extra stuff you have to do to be a teacher. Meetings, learning all of this educational jargon, getting certified in random things, numbers and graphs. My God I HATE numbers and graphs.

I just suck it up and function on a type of autopilot. I think I do a pretty decent job in the classroom because I do want to do my job well, and it is important. My students are learning (I think). But I just can’t seem to make myself care about it. I just don’t care. I don’t. But there doesn’t seem to be any escape. Sure there are other jobs. But they all seem the same to me.

So where I am at now is here: how can I be faithful to God + thrive as a believer doing something that only kind of matters to me? This is the question that drives my life. The idea of a “calling” doesn’t seem to matter. This is where things are. I have to be faithful where I am. Maybe something will happen down the road, but I can’t hang my hat on that. I am not down the road. I am here. Now.  

This is crucial. My wife needs me to be able to function and be present in all of life. My daughter needs this too. My students need this. My employer needs this. I need this.

The driving desire to be a missionary is still present. I have had to unfollow all sorts of mission groups on social media because they are always posting these recruitment pieces. “Won’t you go?” “Will you join?” “Do something that matters.” blah, blah, blah. These posts are a painful reminder, that those invitations aren’t for everyone. They’re only for a few people.

I have the skills and knowledge to be a missionary, but how do I give my life away as a teacher or truck driver or whatever? I guess at the root of it all I just want to be part of whatever God is doing. So if I have to be a teacher and just cryptically show the kindness of God’s love to my students as my way of fulfilling the Great Commission and pray for them while talking about the Industrial Revolution, then that’s what it is.

Maybe that is all the faithfulness required of me? I don’t know, but I’m going to try to make the best of things and see if God can take me off autopilot and bring me to be passionate again.

ADDITIONAL NOTE: I want to add that we have a lot of friends involved in missions and with mission organizations. We give to missions and keep up with newsletters and things like that. I haven’t posted these kinds of thoughts much because I’m paranoid it might make some of them feel guilty somehow or something. That would be awful. We have the blessing to be friends with and in prayer for people doing some beautiful things for the kingdom on foreign fields and domestic. It’s a wonderful thing to contemplate and I am grateful for them, not envious. …well, maybe a little.

-joshua (2017).