Not alone

"We read to know we are not alone," wrote CS Lewis.  This is one of my favorite quotations.  I had a professor who said some of his best friends were books.  A book can offer amazing companionship.  The Catcher in the Rye and Holden Caulfield were my good friends in tenth grade.  I loved the ducks in Central Park question, the baseball glove, discussion of pimples, and the"phonies".  Holden got it.

Tenth grade was also the year I gave up reading horoscopes.  I was reading some teenage-ish magazine's horoscope, and MY horoscope stated that I would meet a cute boy near my locker and that we'd fall in love.  I got really peeved because a) I didn't have a locker and b) there were no boys at my school.  So, I was not going to fall madly in love that month.  Not only that, but it was wrong from its conception: it was using the law of averages (lockers and boys are pretty safe bets for most high schools), and my situation didn't fit.  For some reason, this resonated deeply in my teenage philosophical sensibilities.

So, I've transferred my disdain of horoscopes to daily devotionals.  Seriously, how on target can they be?  And, I can't do daily devotionals for women.  I find them insulting (clearly, I have some deep-seated issues.)

But, the human condition is universal.  JD Salinger nailed teenage angst and ennui.  The horoscopist nailed my desire to fall in love with a cute boy... just didn't realize how high the odds were stacked against me.  And, I think the universality is especially true on a spiritual level.  St. Augustine's description of "the God-shaped hole" in our hearts is the crux of so much pain.

Anyway, that was a really long introduction to the fact that I've been reading two daily devotionals recently.  One is "Streams in the Desert Volume 1" that I bought for $2.00 and smells like it's older than I am but in a bookish way.  And the other one is cheesy, but I'm enjoying it: Jesus Calling by Sarah Young.  It's written in Jesus's voice-- it's as if he's talking to you.  It's super cheesy and a great reminder of his realness.  And, it's really short.

Streams in the Desert was first copyrighted in 1925, so it can be a little stilted at times.  (But, if you read this blog, you'll do just fine with it.)  But, July 31st entry was perfect for my July 31, 2012:

"He guided them by the skillfulness of his hands." (Psa. 78:72)

When you are doubtful as to your course, submit your judgment absolutely to the Spirit of God, and ask Him to shut against you every door but the right one... Meanwhile keep on as you are and consider the absence of indication to be the indication of God's will that you are on His track... As you go down the long corridor, you will find that He has preceded you, and locked many doors which you would fain have entered; but beyond these there is one which He has left unlocked. Open it and enter, and you will find yourself face to face with a bend of the river of opportunity, broader and deeper than anything you had dared to imagine in your sunniest dreams.  Launch forth upon it; it conducts to the open sea.

God guides us, often by circumstances.  At one moment the way may seem utterly blocked; and then shortly afterward some trivial incident occurs, which might not seem much to others, but which to the keen eye of faith speaks volumes. Sometimes these are repeated in various ways, in answer to prayer. They are not haphazard results of chance, but the opening up of circumstances in the direction we would walk. And they begin to multiply as we advance toward our goal, just as the lights do as we near a populous town, when darting through the land by night express. -F.B. Meyer 

I really needed these words and the pictures they paint yesterday (and today) and don't think it was haphazard results of chance that I came across them.  Right now, it does feel like I'm walking down a long corridor with a lot of locked doors.  But, it helps to think of God as a parent locking doors/ putting up safety walls to prevent my doing something really stupid.

And, although it feels futile to keep applying to jobs, and writing letters trying to figure out licensure.  I'm always finding the balance between faith and action.  It's as my grandpa used to say, "The harder I work, the luckier I get."  I need to keep going down the corridor trying doors, knowing that I'm not alone.