the problem with burning bushes

I have this friend. Let’s call her “Anne,” just for anonymity’s sake.

Saying this summer was a rough one for Anne would be an understatement. This past year, in fact, has been pretty exhausting and frustrating for Anne. One of the most difficult and enduring obstacles throughout the year was a lack of clarity regarding where her life is going.

Everyone wants to know the direction our lives are going and what our purpose is in this vast, complex world. We do all sorts of funny things to try and figure it out. We read books. We try to interpret sloppy tea dregs at the bottom of mugs. We take online quizzes that promise to reveal our dream jobs. We scribble the pros and cons of our various options on handmade charts. We pester the people who are closest to us with “Well…you know me…what do you think I should do?”

And then we look for signs. That’s right. We look for signs to tell us what to do with our lives. I’m not just referring to religious people. Not just the superstitious or spiritualists either. Regardless of our beliefs, our faith, or our lack thereof, we all look for signs when we’ve lost our way and are desperate to learn who we are or why we’re here.

Underneath it all, I think most of us believe our destinies are caught up in something bigger than just ourselves. Regardless of what certain cantankerous philosophers have argued in the past (and present), I find it hard to accept that humans are intended to be solitary creatures who live out their miserable days, hopelessly disconnected from each other and living out a purposeless term of years. My life was and is not an isolated accident. I don’t exist simply to slog my way through a meaningless, short life until one day, my life spark is snuffed out by an accident, illness, or old age.

The truth is, we’re undeniably connected. Our lives are – for better of for worse – interwoven with all sorts of other peoples’ lives. It follows that our purpose is also not isolated; it fits into something beyond itself as well.

Which brings me back to the sign-seeking. We’d love it if some mighty higher power would take half a second of their time to reach down into our humble, mundane world and make it obnoxiously clear as to which direction we should pursue with our lives.

Hey, that’s not such a crazy idea, right? After all, the Holy Spirit settled into a bush in order to communicate with Moses, spontaneously igniting it (and probably raising Moses’ blood pressure significantly). God also struck Paul blind while he was walking down a road in order to get his attention. Very effective.

We joke about wanting a sign like that in our lives. Minus the blindness, of course. And the weird spontaneously burning vegetation, because that’s a definite fire hazard. In fact…don’t send a sign if it will inconvenience or unnerve us in any way…

Here’s the thing. Would you really want a sign if you actually got one? Would you even listen to it? Chances are, you’d sit there second-guessing if it really happened or if it was all in your head. And what if you don’t get the sign when you ask for it? Will you just use that as an excuse for further inaction and internal debate?

Let’s stop all this talk about signs for a minute. You want to know your life’s purpose? Here you go. I’ll hit the basics (take notes, if you’d like):

1. To be loved – by God and people – and love them all back. While you’re at it, try to love yourself too (not in the narcissistic, putting mirrors all over your house to stare at yourself all day kind of way. More like accepting yourself for who you are and not focusing on “fixing” unimportant things that never actually mattered). Your life’s primary purpose never, ever, ever had anything to do with a job title, certain level of income, being the best-looking, most popular, the list goes on and on. Never.

2. Every other part of your purpose flows out of #1. Look for jobs you love. Live in places you love. Find hobbies you love. I know, you’re not always going to be enamored with your circumstances. When your circumstances are making you want to tear your hair out, focus on Purpose #1, keeping your eyes and ears open for the next step to take.

It’s not like God’s sitting up there in heaven, laughing while He makes your life into an impenetrable maze. If you take a moment (or two, or three..) to reflect on who you really are and what you’re genuinely passionate about, you’ll eventually know what to do when you reach the forks in the road.

Or, you can sit on your bum waiting for the bush in your front yard to spontaneously ignite. Your call.

my top 5: things to fear at seminary

There are all sorts of inspirational sayings and quotes about not letting fear cast a shadow on your life or influence your decisions. Sayings like “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself” [FDR]. There are numerous passages in scripture about standing firm against fear of people or things of this world and how God is the only one we should ever fear.

These quotes all sound great, really. Especially when they make it into movies as soundbites you hear while epic music is playing in the background and the hero is saving the day, against all odds.

Funnily enough, when it comes to real life, they don’t hold as much traction. Deep down, we’re all a bunch of scaredy-cats (in one way or another), trying to convince ourselves we have things under control as the world goes spinning by.

We especially feel fear when change is on the horizon. In barely over two months, I’ll be finished with my Americorps position in Jamestown. I’ll spend the rest of the year as a beach bum at my parents’ house in South Carolina. I can honestly say I’m not too afraid of that transition.

However, then I start North Park Seminary in January. New city. New place. New people. The fear associated with those changes are manageable to me. It’s being a student at the Seminary that’s flipping me out a little. After some thought, I’ve identified the top 5 things are making me nervous.

1. Actually being at Seminary

This may sound strange, but bear with me here. Firstly, I’m afraid of getting caught in the bubble that exists at pretty much every college campus or close-knit community. I don’t want my perspective to get so skewed that I stop paying attention to or caring about what’s going on outside of North Park. I definitely don’t want to get so comfortable there that I stop being challenged and lose contact with people who think differently than me.

I’m also nervous about the people at Seminary. I keep thinking they’re going to be wayyy too serious. Working at camp for 4 out of the last 6 summers , plus working with the youth at my church for the last 2 years, has kept me pretty young at heart (a.k.a. immature? That’s a good possibility..). Beyond that, I’ll be one of the younger students at Seminary. I feel like I’ll be laughing inappropriately during class and making jokes about all the wrong things, while my fellow students shake their heads and pray for me to grow up. I’m worried they’re going to try and make every conversation super heavy and deep. I can picture me in the corner, scheming about pranking my next door neighbors or plotting to run away from school on a pirate ship, while the other students are debating various theological doctrines and whatnot. This leads to my next fear, which is…

2. People wondering what on earth I’m doing in Seminary (and how I got in)

Funny thing is, I wouldn’t have guessed I’d end up in Seminary if you’d asked me a few years ago. Plans change. What I want to do with my life hasn’t changed drastically over the last couple of years, but my route to getting there has. I’m OK with that, and I’m OK knowing God’s plan for my life isn’t always going to match up with the ideas I had…but Seminary was kind of a surprise, even for me. If someone who didn’t know me well looked back on what I’ve studied (history, political science, and Spanish at a secular liberal arts school) and what I want to be (namely, that I don’t want to be a pastor at this point), they’d be understandably confused about why I am in Seminary. Some people don’t even think women should be in Seminary.

The reason I’m going back to school and the reason I’m pursuing two Masters Degrees at North Park (Masters of Divinity and Masters of Non-profit Administration) is so I can run a faith-based nonprofit organization one day. There are many other ways to do that beyond the route I’m taking, but I think this dual program between the Business school and Seminary is the best way to prepare me. I’m excited for all that I’ll learn at the Seminary (I get to study Hebrew, Greek, biblical studies courses, church history, and all sorts of things). I just need to keep remembering that despite my youth and the fact I don’t really want to be a pastor – in other words, despite the fact I don’t feel like I am going to fit the mold of a lot of the other students – the things that are different about me are only going to add to the community there.

3. College loans

Finances. Ew.

I am lucky enough to not be under a staggering amount of debt from undergrad, but I still loathe the idea of taking out more loans, even if they’re small ones. Psychologically, it’s painful to go from spending 2+ years (post-graduation from Allegheny) making money to reverting back to taking out college loans.

Technically, this can all be resolved by faking my own death at the end of school. However, that plan seems somewhat complicated and leaves too much room for disaster, so I guess I’ll just have to pay my loans back. Maybe I’ll be done by the time I’m 40 (fingers crossed).

4. Committing to a 4-5 year program

That’s right, you read that correctly. 4-5 YEARS. Do you have any idea how old I’ll be by then?!? 29. 29 years old. 29 times around the sun. 4-5 years is such a long time to be (mostly) in one place, doing (mostly) the same thing. I know I’ll get to leave to do internships, plus I’ll be living in one of the greatest cities in this country, but still…

Commitment is terrifying.

5. Last but not least, Wife-hunters.

If this one doesn’t sound like it’s a legitimate fear, you’ve clearly never met a single Christian guy who is deadset on finding a wife. As fast as possible. Factor in that the guys at Seminary are future pastors (who feel enormous pressure to find a wife before settling down with a congregation), and you should start to feel this fear too. I find it vaguely disturbing that currently my #1 reason I would want to get married soon is so I don’t have to deal with Wife-hunters and their crazy antics. They’re frightening in their single-minded quest to find a Mrs. and start a family.

I’m not anti-marriage or anything, but I don’t think people should get married out of fear that they have to be married by a certain age or life stage. And they definitely shouldn’t be obsessed with finding a spouse. It’ll happen when it happens…there’s no use in wasting the best years of your life scheming various ways to hunt them down and convince them to marry you.


That rounds out my top 5 fears and I think they're pretty legit at this point. It's not like I'm going to let fear stop me from going to North Park - I just think it's better to get my anxiety out into the open so it's not eating at my mind or growing any bigger than it already is. Like any other feeling, fear will fade away. One day, I'm sure I'll look back on this time in my life and not remember why I ever felt any of those fears; they'll probably look ridiculous. That's alright, since there's a little bit of the ridiculous in everything. I just hope I can remember that after I've gone through Seminary.