There’s something weird going on in my house right now. I can hear myself think. For the first part of the week, my parents were vacationing in Montauk in NY. I saw the pics. I can’t wait to get out there one day myself…long walks on the beach, the sound of waves lulling me to sleep. Ahhh….
The parents returned on Thursday, and my sister and her crew rolled out of here Thursday evening for a week in FL. I forgot what it was like to be able to think. To have a conversation without being contantly interrupted. Ahhh…
This week is also officially “girl problem week.” I don’t know if there is something floating around in the atmosphere. Almost every woman that I’ve spoken to has had some weird guy problems. He’s dating someone else and it cuts. He moves across the country. He moved in next door. These are deep heart issues.
This week has forced me to look myself in the eye and, once again, define what I consider to be the norm for my life. I can’t let a married person define my norm, because being married is their norm. I can’t let friends determine my norm because I have a different career path, a different set of goals. I have to wrestle out issues in my own life, see what the Bible says should be my norm and work from that set of data. And quite frankly, this is something that we all have to do. If you do not have a center line, you are going to live a life that is constantly striving to be in focus rather than living a life of focus.
I work with the knowledge that nothing is a surprise to God. I’m 31 and single, working for a Korean company that is new in the US, serving in a church that is new in its community, living in my parents house. God didn’t wake up this morning (not that He sleeps, work with me here) and say, “Crap! How did Deneen get there?” God is using these circumstances that were not on my life’s goal sheet to prepare me for something.
When I find myself discouraged, frustrated, disillusioned with my circumstances, I go back to the scriptures that God has spoken into my life. I have four scriptures that are my heart beat; they are the oxygen tank and life support when I want to give up and die.
Right now, the norms for my life are:
- Being single is normal
- Working long hours for a start-up comany in which the primary language is not my native tongue is normal
- Living with my parents is normal
- Serving in a start up church in which they do not speak the same church language as I is normal
My norms do not line up with the norms of mainstream America. But I do believe that my norms line up with the Bible.
- God is preparing me for a life wherein living outside of my culture is almost comfortable.
- God is developing me into the woman that He’s called me to do while I am single so that one day I can have a marriage that is off the charts.
- God is allowing me to live with my parents so that I can save money and pay off my bills.
- God is allowing me to serve in a new church so that when I begin planting churches, I know what works and what doesn’t work.
All in all, I see God in all of my circumstances.
Deneen White 