I am back from my summer hiatus of blogging! So much has happened in the past few months, and it amazes me constantly what God can do in such a short amount of time in us.
If third year was a kiddie pool, fourth year is an Olympic sized one. Before, all you had to do was splash around, now you go a lap then back. You actually have to swim. It’s one thing to know all this information in your head, and it’s another to apply it to someone in front of you.
In the summer, I was overwhelmed by the newness that comes with clinics 1-2x a week and 3 patients a session at that, and now I was on schedules with 30-70 patients a day. I was fortunately not alone, and my fellow extern and I began to get into the groove of daily clinical care. I learned about patient management, private practice life (all the yummy rep lunches), and saw a life I never knew existed outside of school.
I would say my first quarter was full of newness. I did more punctal plugs than I could count, and I developed friendships with the staff. I got to know a classmate and now friend as we worked side by side (literally).
The doctors were incredibly supportive, understanding, and helpful in this initial phase of my journey. I think this new season of my life was scary because it was real. School life isn't what clinic life looks like in reality. Seeing people, dealing with the brokenness of the healthcare system, and battling my nagging insecurities - it’s reality.
At my second rotation, it’s been a whirlwind of medical optometry. My mind has been bent, stretched, and totally humbled by the vastness of ocular disease. It’s one thing to read a textbook and answer a multiple choice question, it’s another to piece together in real time.
I’ve been asked countless times what’s next? Where do you see yourself? Where will you go?
I’m not sure what path I’ll be partaking in. I still have boards ahead. I still have many mountains to climb. I have stumbled to the top more than I can count and slipped down just when I got my footing. The humility of being a sheep.
I feel a ? mark over my life, but I don’t feel as afraid as I used to be. I used to be afraid of that symbol. The unknown.
God, You see me here. You saw where I was. You see where I will be. The ? over my life isn’t because my future is unknown it’s safely held hidden for me.
I thought at 25 I would feel like an adult, but I find myself feeling less than I’ve ever thought I knew. I feel only uncertainty about what’s ahead. I don’t even feel like it’s anxiety, I feel like it’s entering into reality that I can’t hold onto any comfort or peace in my life here.
I’ve had plans and dreams rerouted too many times to keep believing that. I’ve learned and I will keep having to relearn that life is better lived with open hands.
It’s easy to think that achieving certain milestones will provide any promise of your future. That once we get that job or finish school or get insert whatever you’ve been wanting that it’ll all come together. That the ? will turn into . because the wondering, the longing, the fear will be over.
When I think about the questions of what the future holds and the hope for assurance, I turn to the greatest act of love fulfilled.
“When he had received the drink, Jesus said, “It is finished.” With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.” John 19:30
Jesus does not only hold all the promise we long for but He is exactly the promise of every searching we’ve had. He doesn’t look to replace what you’ve lost, He is what you were looking for. He doesn’t only come to fix what was broken, He comes to restore what you never knew it could look like to belong, to be loved, to be seen, to be accepted, and above all to be forgiven.
“For no matter how many promises God has made, they are “Yes” in Christ. And so through him the “Amen” is spoken by us to the glory of God. Now it is God who makes both us and you stand firm in Christ. He anointed us, set his seal of ownership on us, and put his Spirit in our hearts as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come.” 2 Corinthians 1:20-22
A deposit is an assurance that something belongs to you. When we belong to Jesus, our life is actually a , because it is not yet the end but it is still in the process of coming to promised fruition.
When people we love pass away, when we are struck with physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual afflictions, when we are on our last dollar or we are somewhere far worse than imagined, Jesus does not offer a distant future of hope to us. He does not sigh and tell us just to hold on a little longer, throwing verses or empty phrases. He clothes Himself in our suffering, He cannot sleep from the anguish, and He offers no remedy besides His own redemptive pain.
I really struggle to comfort others. The minute words leave my mouth I cringe at the cliches or inadequacy of my ability to bring any semblance of clarity in their confusion. I think there is so much in just sitting in someone’s sorrow, to say we’re not really sure what to say, and to be with them in the trenches. I can’t promise it’ll get better. I can’t say from my own strength it’ll all work out in the end.
I think it also reveals my own inability to comfort myself. Nowadays, I often think about how human I am. In my helplessness, I am only human. Living in my limitations and uncertainty like everyone else.
My dad always tells me you never know how your choices will turn out. No one knows if it was good you went back to school or pursued that career path. No one knows if the person you go on a first date with will be someone you’ll have a meaningful future with in a year's time. We make choices every moment not quite knowing the full gravity of these decisions.
“The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may follow all the words of this law.” Deuteronomy 29:29
Instead of focusing on what we’ll never know, we can hold onto the innumerable things that God already tells us. The word of God provides so much we already know, and we still doubt and wonder. More knowledge, therefore, is not what we need. What we need to to trust that what we have is all we need to know and love God and live out our best days with Him.
“He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you?
To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.” Micah 6:8
When I travel somewhere, getting from A to B, I never go without knowing every step of the way. It would be crazy for me to take it one step at a time, and that’s the radical reality of trusting God. You know He will make a way, but does it look like parting the Red Seas? Did you imagine it would take walking into the den of hungry lions or sending a flood? For Jesus, He was the only one who knew the cross that was in store for Him, and even that was a tremendous act of faith.
In some moments when we are waiting on God to reveal things to us, I wonder if God is waiting for us to act on what we already know. To have the faith to move even if we only know the next step ahead and nothing more. It’s not that God will not move unless we move, I believe God will do exactly what He needs to do to complete His perfect work.
In the midst of my questions, I find hope that no answer will truly suffice what only the presence and love of Jesus can bring. It’s easy to trust a good plan, but it takes extraordinary faith to trust a good God who knows the plans He has in store for you.
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