Today’s scripture: Isaiah 11:1-9 (NRSV) (The Message) (KJV) What might God be saying to me?
My thoughts (Ciemone Easter-Rose):
In the months leading up to and following my graduation from college, I felt particularly angsty. I was a psychology major, and the logical “next step” for me was to go to graduate school. But I was tired of being a student, and I didn’t feel ready for grad school. The problem was, I didn’t really know what else I wanted to do either! I ended up receiving an offer for a really great opportunity to work with impoverished youth on the West Side of Chicago. It was a year-long position that would have filled my time well and fed my drive for helping others while I prepared to enter graduate school (and it would have looked great on my applications). But I ended up turning down the position. Why? Because my priorities at that time were not in order. It actually all came down to a woman with whom I was involved, and my misguided belief that I somehow needed her in my life. I shifted from the logical next step to the emotional one, sacrificing what I really wanted to do for what I felt I needed to do to keep her. Sure enough, shortly after giving up that wonderful opportunity, she and I broke up anyway. I was then left in despair — floundering, directionless, and without any clear purpose. I wound up with a job that I hated, and was back in the classroom pursuing my master’s degree less than a year later. Although it worked out in the end, I feel like I lost a year of purposefulness in my life, and added to my collection of life regrets in the process. My transition to the Ph.D. was smoother — but, now that I’m nearly done, I find myself entering yet another period of transition and uncertainty. In just a few months, I will have reached the end of that journey — and, if I’m being perfectly honest, I don’t really know what I want next. Unlike the last time, however, I want to make sure that I allow God to guide my decisions rather than have to come rescue me from them.
There have been a considerable number of other times in my life when my poor decisions have led me down paths of potential destruction. Many of these paths should have completely derailed me and made it impossible for me to be where I am now. But they didn’t, by God’s grace, so here I am. I think that there is an important lesson that can be learned from the passage in Isaiah (11:1-9). Whatever destiny lies ahead of us, we have an important choice to make regarding how we take our journeys. We may sometimes make decisions in life that we don’t really understand, or that we later regret. But it is God who can smooth our paths out, particularly during periods of uncertainty. If we allow “the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord” (v. 2) to enter our lives, we can have peace even in these periods of uncertainty. This time, I will be meditating more than ever on God’s word and allowing God’s spirit to help me to discern the next direction that I move in. I trust that will lead me toward the right “next step.”
Question of the Day: When you feel like you are stumbling around in darkness or flailing in your uncertainty, will you allow God to light the pathway to your next destination?
We encourage you to include a time of prayer with this reading. If you need a place to get started, consider the suggestions on the How to Pray page.