I’m scared. I’m scared to get stuck in the hamster wheel of life. I’m scared to get caught up in the rat race: a race with no start, no end, and no prize. I’m scared to have a meaningless college degree. I’m scared to waste my parents’ savings on a degree that I could have learned from the local library. I’m scared to have a job that I don’t care for. I’m scared to have a job that uses me as an expendable machine. I’m scared to be a machine working for the world. I’m scared to be just another cog in the wheel of society. I’m scared to become a zombie, drifting mindlessly through life. I’m scared that I won’t be able to add value to the lives of others. I’m scared to have no purpose. I’m scared to have no freedom.
But, I wish to be free. I wish to live with purpose. I wish to spend my time how I please. I wish not to be tied to a job, but to the wanderings of my mind. I wish to work for the Lord wherever He needs me. I wish to add value to the lives of others. I wish to be a unique part of the Body of Christ and not just another cog in society. I wish to live in line with God’s unique purpose for my life. I wish to be my unique self.
And Jesus, I ask that you can give me the courage to follow you and not the ways of the world. I ask that you can give me confidence to follow the path that you have set for me and not the easy, meaningless path the world sets forth. Help me to have more confidence in You, in my beliefs, and in myself. Don’t let me succumb to false comfort, Lord. Don’t let me fall into the trap that is the rat race. But let me find comfort in You and in your promises. Let me be comforted in the fact that your will be done. And Lord, thank you for being who you are. Thank you for lifting me up when I am down. Thank you for making me who I am. Help me to understand that I can’t do anything without you. Keep me humbled and looking up. Amen!
“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” — Jeremiah 29:11
“If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with success unexpected in common hours.” — Henry David Thoreau