Day 023: God Provides

"Also do not be concerned about your goods, for the best of all the land of Egypt is yours."  Genesis 45:20

At the end of the story of Joseph, after all its twists and turns, for the better and the worse, this message sums up the entire story.

Our lives are in God's hands.  We can choose to do things one way or another, but God has the final say.  God also wants us to be successful.  God wants us to be the best that we can be.  However, we, in our immaturity, can't always know what's best for us.  Sometimes we have a vision about what's best for us.

When I look back on the past few years, I notice that things haven't always gone my way.  I wanted to leave home after high school, so I auditioned and made it in to Longy School of Music.  While I was there, I began to learn more about how to perform everyday house tasks and how to live life more healthily.  However, I was only able to stay there for a year, and I hated the fact that I had to come back home.  I didn't like having to go to a different university.  But, while I was studying at the University of Houston, I learned much more about my interests, particularly by improving my writing.  I also met two of my best friends by studying there.  Though I had many frustrations in the University of Houston, I graduated from there, and then moved to Chicago to go to graduate school at Chicago College of Performing Arts.  It was there in Chicago that I was able to perfect my music making and where I was able to explore more freely my life as a Christian.  I made another very close friend while there.  After graduating, I didn't make it into any program that I had auditioned for, so, once again, I felt like a failure coming back home to Houston.

Up until the past month or so, I hated answering the innocuously American question, "So, what do you do?"  I hated not having an answer.  Before, I was able to impress, by saying I was doing a double major, or I was studying in a far away city, or I was pursuing my master's at a relatively young age.  I was only able to stumble for words.  But, the past few months of being back here have brought me so many amazing things and people, particularly my amazing boyfriend and an opportunity to perform historical music, a style I had not been able to play nor practice seriously for almost six years - a style of music that many had looked down upon me for.  I have also been able to learn more about the Episcopal Church and God in this time.

I may have my own goals, and Joseph may have had his own as well.  But, through the many twists and turns that we must go through in life, we shall see that God always provides.  God is good, and God is great.  God is holding me by the hand through life, and I strive never to let go.