The ending of the first reading for the day that I’m writing this says “for I am with you, Yahweh declares, to rescue you.” Jer 17-19. I use to never expect much from God, I was always scared that if I prayed really hard for something, and I didn’t get it, I would break, and lose faith. Ultimately what happened is that I did break and it was faith that would get me not what I wanted but what I needed.
Well it’s official I’ve been at my job for one year now. By far the greatest experiences I’ve had in this first year that I’ve had a job was being able to travel to the Philippines (and Korea kind of) for the first time by myself to attend the ICON. Since I was in secondary school I have been on and off the job hunt with an online application here, job fair there, and the occasional interview that lead no where, and doing this over years I had become callus about job applications.
However in the month that I got hired was a lot different. I didn’t really know that I was claiming it or what “claiming it” even meant, but in the month or so before I got my job I knew I would go to ICON. Around this time it would have been the middle of summer, I had not payed my tuition for the previous school semester, so there was no way I could go to my second year, and I was surviving of the last of scraps of a freelance job I had been payed very late for, oh and of course my credit card was maxed out (as it always is in these kind of stories). In spite of all this, I said to myself “I am going to ICON”.
Now I didn’t have the same kind of confidence in the statement as it make it to seem, again, at the time I didn’t have a job and it didn’t look like I could be going back to school anytime soon. In a very desperate attempt to get my life back to together I applied for and got an interview for a job inside of a new warehouse, and I was prepared to take the job full time and not go back to school. After the interview I had a Leaders Assembly to attend right after so I went straight there from my interview. Before the assembly even began I actually got an email saying they would not be continuing with my application, I remember being really upset, that I actually left the room of the assembly to be alone in the church. I don’t remember what exactly my thoughts were, but I just kept thinking that nothing was going my way, I need this job so badly and I had no idea what I was going to do.
A week or two pass, and I end up applying for a job, for the second time actually at my second location of choice, and low and behold I actually got called in for an interview. I had known many other people who had also gotten the same job that I was interviewing for so I actually went into the interview felling more prepared than ever. I had gone to general area of the interview really early as I was compelled to go the parish nearby St. Patricks for a casual visit. What ended up becoming of it was that there was actually adoration occurring, so I ended up actually staying a good 30-40 minutes, and so I took a street car to the venue. After getting off however I realized I had gotten the address wrong, and that the interview was taking place 30 minutes away from where I was which was the same amount of time I had left before my interview. Right away I called an Uber (mind you I’m still barely surviving. I actually made my interview with good time, everything seemed fine, and I was ready to kill it at my interview, but the interview ended up being 5 minutes max, two questions and I request to smile for 30 seconds (I’m serious). I left the interview not feeling good about it. I ended up meeting with a friend who also had an interview for the same job afterwords, and we talked about it.
What came next is perhaps one of the greatest moments of grace in my recent life, because I actually got called saying I got the job, needless to say I was ecstatic. What I ended up coming away from this, over a year later has actually been a lesson that the Lord has been trying to teach me for this past year, and that is on desiring. I was always looking for a job, but I really only wanted it for a vague sentiment of “saving up”, and actually during this whole story wanting to go to ICON wasn’t even on my mind, I was actually just desperate, and at this point I wasn’t relying on myself anymore.