Shooooooeeeey!!! I'm a pretty simple person. I love to hear people laugh and share the joys in their lives. I think since moving I've been shell shocked. Only now am I coming back around to who I am, and I have missed her so very much! ;) I dance randomly through my life...sometimes I have witnesses but usually it's just me and God.
One story my hubby often reminds me of from when we were dating is a time when he drove past the drive thru window and I was dancing. No music on or anything to speak of, just dancing to my own song. I think that sums me up pretty well. The best part of that short story is that it was a miserable place to work, but I had a blast there. It was fast food and I smelled like oil every day that I went home. But I went to work six days a week, usually for 10 hours a day and looked for joy. I looked for God to show up in the best ways. Birds taking a bath in a puddle made me feel alive, it was awesome. That foundation of finding joy in chaos made me feel unique as a person, kinda special. I love life and when I find people to share life with it's awesome.
What makes my soul sing today is knowing that God has been with me every moment of my life and that He always delivers big when I ask for help. When I reached a maddening breaking point after being at the fast food restaurant for eight years, he gave me a job running a coffeeshop. Ya wanna know how it happened? One of my assistant managers was dealing drugs in my men's room. Yep, talk about a bad work enviornment. When I caught wind of it, I let my area supervisor know and assumed she'd want me to terminate him. Makes sense, right? Only to a large company in this case. Because she had no replacement for me she let me make the decision. Ya know, keep him or let him go and return to working 80 hours a week. Of course I let him go, did I mention he was a friend of mine? It sucked. During this time I could see no light at the end of the tunnel, my joy was temporarily hazy. Suddenly I detested my job, an emotion I was very uncomfortable with. I had interviewed months earlier for an assistant managers position for a company I was working for part time, but had been told I was overqualified. I had been heartbroken, it was unlikely that the same company that said I was overqualified was going to give me a store since I was working one shift per week at that point. Regretfully I knew what was going to happen in the short term and I had to give up my part time job. I couldn't even make time to put in a four hour shift at my dream job... so sad. Anyway, I prayed. Praying isn't really what I was doing, it was more like begging God for a way out of my current situation. I quit my job and a couple days later I got a call to please come in for an exit interview. It was very relaxed and I talked about how regretful I was to leave the store. He (his name is Bob) called me a couple days later to set up another interview. I explained the only free time I had was at 7am. 7am. So because God was using this man (it's the only reason I can come up with, really) Bob set up our interview at 7am on a Friday morning. Not only was I hired as a Store Manager, but I was the only one he interviewed. I had the joy of working for that company for a total of eight years and experienced a lot of personal growth there. As well as a lot of joy. :) I was already a beliver and knew that God would help me, but it was the first of many times in my life when He directly answered a prayer for *me*. A prayer that I begged for when I was alone in my apartment and didn't have to have my game face on.
I've been in my new city for four months. I begged God for a change in my life back in February. I was having a hard time, but didn't want to admit it to anyone. Not even my husband. Like the time He pulled me out of the fast food restaurant, he removed me just as swiftly and cleanly from one life and inserted me into this one. In my new city, I've struggled with the adjustment but didn't see it. I assume it's to be expected, but truthfully, I didn't know I was struggling until recently. How did I finally see it? I danced in the street the other night and it struck me that I've not expressed that personal joy in months. I'm so glad to see me again!
His agape love leaves me breathless.
No comments:
Post a Comment