Late Night Transparency

It's late. I was up past 3 last night, and I woke this morning at 6. I've been going all day-in fact, I've been going all week. But that's a good thing.

I am done with my job. Last friday was my last day. Saturday I go into a 6 1/2 week intensive training seminar for my new position as a college missionary, and I fear that I am not ready. But maybe that's mostly because it's late.

I think it just started hitting me on the way home. I watched Sideways at J.P.'s house tonight, and when I got in the car I was thinking about my own emotions, feeling a bit like the guy in the movie, and I realized with a sense of finality that I am leaving. Over the Rhine was playing on my radio, and I kept repeating the same song over and over. More because the slow reflective groove felt the mood than because of the lyrics. But as I drove slowly home, I realized that I'm really doing it. I'm really leaving everything and moving to be a college missionary. I have really thrown away my steady salary for an income that is reliant on the generosity of other people. And I got a little sad and a little scared.

I'm sad to be leaving everyone, but that's not all that bad. I'm scared because I don't feel ready. I don't feel ready to be a missionary. I'm a joke. I'm not the guy that people would see as being a missionary. I drink too much. I smoke too much. I swear too much. (I promised myself I would never be so transparent on my blog, but it's late and I don't really want to call anyone, so here I am.)

At any rate, I have begun to understand that it's okay. Not that it's okay for me to be doing those things, but it's okay for me to consider myself a Christian in spite of my incorrigibility. God loves me, and he is working on making me into a better person. I am working on being more pliable, and I'm going to trust that God will continue to mold me as I yield. I pray that I yield more often. And Meg was right, it's better to go into this situation thinking you aren't spiritually cut out for it than to think you are. Knowing that I need to work on myself ensures that I will work on myself. I guess, in a way, I am afraid of the day when I think I'm done.

Don't worry. I know I'm not. But like I said, it's late, and I should get some sleep.