I feel like that a lot. I'm 34 years old and stuck in a dead end job. I worked hard to earn a college degree, only to end up working for a company paying me what high school graduates earn. I look at friends and people I meet who are younger than me and it's hard not to feel jealous. They're moving right up in the world. Working jobs with companies that appreciate them, getting promotions, raises, and doing well for themselves.
When I look in the mirror and see gray hair starting to show, I feel like a loser.
I look for a new job online every day. I call, e-mail, and network to let people know I'm looking for an opportunity. Applications sent, resumes reworked and mailed, all for the same result.
Nothing.
It's painful. It makes me want to crawl in bed and disappear. It makes me wonder, is God is doing anything at all or am I just adrift in a corporate nightmare?
I'm very blessed to have a wonderful wife. One night I was feeling particularly stressed out and down. after I had gone to bed, she got up and printed off a quote from Oswald Chambers. She put it in a small picture frame and left it on my wallet.
I always spend time in the mornings in prayer. This one morning, I asked God just for a small reminder that He's still with me, still working, and to just show me that I'm not alone. A few minutes after that prayer, I found the picture frame on my wallet. The quote reads,
"A saint's life is in the hands of God like a bow and arrow in the hands of an archer. God is aiming at something the saint cannot see"
It was exactly what I needed to be reminded of that day. When I got to work, I looked up the rest of the quote.
"He stretches and strains, and every now and again the saint says - "I cannot stand any more." God does not heed, He goes on stretching till His purpose is in sight, then He lets fly. Trust yourself in God's hands. For what have you need of patience just now? Maintain your relationship to Jesus Christ by the patience of faith. "Though He slay me, yet will I wait for Him."
We all feel like we're failures at something. We all feel lost at times, like we've been forsaken. However, when we feel this way we have to remember to do to things. First, trust that God is still working in our lives. He's taking aim with us even though we may not see the target. Sometimes it may feel as if there is no target at all, but that's when prayer and faith comes in.
Second, we have to look at what we've been blessed with. Discontent and envy is dangerous because it blinds us from our blessings. I have a comfortable house in a nice neighborhood. I have a wonderful wife. We're doing okay financially. I have a job. I have great friends and family.
I am truly blessed.
We feel like failures when we judge ourselves to the standards set by this world. We realize how loved and blessed we are when we stop judging ourselves and open our eyes to what God has done.
By looking behind us and seeing the path God set us on to get where we are now, we can trust that he's still guiding us on the road ahead. We're his arrow, we just have to trust our archer. He'll send us flying when His time is right, so that He is glorified.
So for now, this arrow waits.
