In part 1 and part 2 of this series, I shared some of my background and inspiration for writing. We pick up the story with me struggling to write in my spare time and seeking discernment in my engineering career. I found the solution for both challenges in the place I should have been looking all along.

The Turning Point

On March 12, 2017 my pastor delivered a sermon that would dramatically alter the course of my life. His words convicted me so deeply that I soon decided to quit my job and write a book. I’m sure you can easily guess the name of the sermon series:

“Keep Calm and Carry On”

Wait. Isn’t that the opposite of what you did?

Bear with me.

When I walked through the doors of the sanctuary that day, my mind wasn’t a blank slate for my pastor to write a neat and orderly message upon. It was a mess, a jumble of thoughts and worries about my career. But God’s word has the power to shake up our mess, to stir our hearts, and to draw out the truth we each need to hear.

That fateful sermon was the last in a four-part series that followed Moses and the Israelites through their Exodus from Egypt. The first three parts prepared me, little by little, for the grand finale.

Promises

Week 1 was called: “Promises.” It explored the promise God made to Moses that He would lead the Israelites out of slavery and into the “Promised Land.” The reading came from Exodus 14. The Israelites had just been “let go” by Pharaoh and were fleeing Egypt. Then God told Moses to circle back around and allow his people to be trapped between the Egyptian army and the Red Sea. God’s command didn’t seem to make sense. They were finally free. Why change course and invite disaster?

My pastor put it this way: “If we’re honest, no matter what God says, no matter how clear He makes Himself to us, we’re going to make the decisions in our life that are calculated, that are logical, that serve our best interest . . . On paper, God’s plan is irresponsible, it’s illogical, it’s risky, it’s dangerous, and it’s exhausting. It doesn’t look like a path toward calmness . . . but these were the instructions that the Israelites were given. See, God’s instructions may not always make sense to us and that’s okay, but we get to trust in an infinite God that isn’t limited by our finite perspective.”

Deep in my mind, a seed was planted. What if God wants you to write full time? So what if you spent years working for a career of your choosing? If God wants something different from you now, how can you deny Him?

But it was still just a tiny seed, an irresponsible, illogical, dangerous thought trying to bud. I stomped on it and rejected it as foolish.

My pastor went on to explain some of God’s most important promises. The takeaway was to trust in the promises of God.

He left us with a cliffhanger. The Egyptian army was closing in on the Israelites. But we didn’t need to wonder about the outcome. If God said he would deliver them, we knew he would.

My pastor asked us to write down something we couldn’t keep calm about. I wrote “my career.” He then told us to pray over that issue using one of God’s promises from a list he provided. I should have done that, but I didn’t. Some of us are a bit slow. Thankfully, there were three more sermons for God to jostle me awake.

Purpose

Week 2 of the sermon series was called “Purpose.” The reading picked up in Exodus 14 with the Israelites standing by the shore as God parts the Red Sea, allowing them to walk across on dry land. My pastor noted that the ordeal the Israelites had faced, being trapped by the Egyptian army, was not just a trial, but an opportunity for God to show up and do what only God could do. We too can view our present trials as opportunities for God to move, or we can cower in fear, unable to act.

My pastor continued, “I believe that God is reaching out His hand to you in your trial the same way that God literally split the Red Sea . . . He’s already paved out the way towards our freedom. He already has it marked out for our good . . . [The Israelites’] path to freedom looked ridiculous . . . but that was God’s path. If they would have said, ‘You know what, this is ridiculous,’ which it looked like it was, ‘Moses you must be crazy,’ which it must have seemed like, if they would have done anything differently, they would have lost their [lives] . . . How about for you and [me]? The path that’s laid out for us is the path that God has [for us]. It’s the path that’s going to lead to our best. But because it doesn’t look right, doesn’t feel right, doesn’t smell right, our friends don’t think it’s a good idea, we want to move off the path. You just have to step out into what is scary according to your eyes but is certain according to God . . . How many of us are missing out on God’s good for us because we’re settling for what is easy, for what we’re accustomed to?”

That budding idea of becoming a writer, the one I thought I’d crushed the week before, came poking up out of the mud. Has God paved a way for me? Is this scary, ridiculous, crazy idea God’s will?

For a second time in as many weeks, I dismissed the thought. God doesn’t want me to abandon all those years of hard work. Besides, what would my friends say? My parents? My coworkers? Rebecca is amazingly supportive, but there’s no way she’d go for that.

We then heard the powerful testimony of a woman who had been diagnosed with ALS, an incurable disease that will eventually leave her paralyzed. She said, “We are often caught up in plans for the future . . . I’m not living in the future and God’s grace isn’t there for me for that day ten months from now, His grace is there for me today, and I need to live in today. And when I do that, I’m not only able to do what I need to do, but I’m thankful.” Her and her husband shared that they had many dreams for their retirement that would no longer be possible, but they focused instead on being thankful for what was, what is, and what will be in Heaven.

I was blown away. I didn’t want to think that we could die young, that we could spend thirty years planning for a retirement that never happens. I had always thought I’d write more after I retired. But what if my body or my mind isn’t able? What if I’m sick or too tired?

Grumbling

The following week, a sermon titled “Grumbling” picked up in Exodus 16. Not one month earlier, God had miraculously freed the Israelites from slavery. They had walked across the Red Sea on dry ground. They had seen the army of their greatest enemy destroyed. But in the desert, they began to grumble.

They faced a food shortage. In their struggle, they looked back on their slavery with rose-colored glasses. For hundreds of years they cried out to be free, but freedom in the face of starvation seemed worthless. They grumbled because they had forgotten God’s past faithfulness. They had ignored His promise.

I could relate to grumbling. I had been doing it for years. I’m tired. I’m stressed out. I never have time for the things I really care about. And on and on. I was thankful for my many blessings. I knew God had seen me through far more troubling times and yet, in the daily grind, I grumbled. “Something’s not right,” I’d say again and again, but I couldn’t figure out what to do instead.

Moses did something his peers did not. He went to God with his trouble. God answered that He would provide for them. Not just because they were hungry, but so that they would know that He is God. He provided exactly the food they needed each day, no more and no less. He told them not to store up extra, but to trust that He would provide every single day as He had done every day before.

My pastor pointed out that God could have given them a year’s supply of food all at once. But then, they would have only gone to God once a year. That’s not the kind of relationship He wants. He wants so much more. He wants us to count on Him. He knows that trusting in our own efforts will lead us to disaster but trusting in Him will lead us to deliverance.

“Grumbling,” my pastor said, “is a symptom of a trust problem.” We complain because we don’t trust that God will provide the solution.

My thoughts returned to my career. I wasn’t trusting that God had the answer.

Prayer

The final Sunday of the sermon series was March 12. The title of the sermon was “Prayer.” The sermon struck Rebecca and me in two very different ways. As it turned out, we needed both.

We rejoined the Israelites in Exodus chapter 17. The people now faced a desperate water shortage. They quarreled with Moses to the point of nearly stoning him.

My pastor asked, “Was God surprised they were in a place with no water?” Of course not. He was the one who led them there. So why would God lead them from a comfortable place to a place of danger and difficulty? Because he was trying to teach the people to trust Him. He desired them to move from a place of independence from Him to dependence on Him.

It was around this point in the sermon that I felt a strong conviction on my heart. I wanted to be independent. I wanted to do the sensible thing and earn my surplus and save for retirement and stay in my comfortable situation forever. I didn’t want to need God to move in my life.

At that moment, something clicked for me. Maybe I was unsettled at work because I was meant to do something else in this season of my life. Maybe my discontent was a nudge from the Holy Spirit. Maybe writing full time is exactly what God wants from me. Not just so that His inspiration can be set free on the world, but so that I would learn to trust Him. So that I would rely on Him to provide.

Surely if I was going to make a living as a writer no one could claim it was my experience or my credentials that did it. If God chose to move, it wouldn’t be rationalized away as the move of a talented human. I’m just not that special.

I let that idea stew for the rest of the sermon. The longer it swished around in my brain, the more at peace I felt. The next step from the sermon was to “declare today your dependence day.”

On the way home, I nervously shared my idea with Rebecca. This is how I imagined the conversation going:

This is how it actually went:

A smile crept up her face, leaping from her cheek to mine. She’s really considering this. I started to explain my reasoning and asked her what she thought.

She knew something very profound. If we talked through it all now, it would be our decision. All we’d be looking for from God was a thumbs up. Whether we got the thumbs up or not wouldn’t matter, we’d just proceed with our plan anyway.

Most of the sermon, the part that Rebecca took to heart, was centered on prayer. With his community threatening to kill him and no solution in sight, Moses turned to God and cried out for help. That was the first takeaway of the sermon: “Cry out to God when life is in chaos.”

God responded to Moses, but not in the way Moses had probably hoped. God told him to strike a rock with his staff, and water would come forth from it. The second takeaway of the sermon was “Prayer reveals the way forward in the trial.” My pastor stated that it is foolish and prideful to take any major steps in our life without going to God in prayer. He also pointed out that we may not like the answer we get.

Many times prior to that day, I went to God in prayer asking Him to reveal the way forward in my career. Many times, I did not hear the answer. I’ve since thought of two reasons why the answer didn’t come sooner.

The first was timing. It simply wasn’t time for a change until it was. I wasn’t ready. Rebecca wasn’t ready. It took years of God slowly working to bring us both to the point where we were receptive to such a radical suggestion.

The second reason the answer didn’t come was that I wasn’t listening. I would say a quick prayer asking for guidance, then promptly go to sleep or carry on with my dinner. I didn’t wait, expecting a response.

Moses did what God told him to do. He stood in front of an assembly ready to stone him, and he hit a rock with a stick. Why did he do such a ridiculous thing? Because he expected God to keep His promise. That’s the third takeaway: “When God speaks, we can expect a miracle.” When we pray, we should pray expectantly. We should expect God to deliver on His promises.

Rebecca expected an answer in prayer. Her faith inspired me. That night we both prayed in silence. I went to my knees at the foot of our bed and cried out to God. My prayer went something like this:

“God, please tell me what to do.”

I stopped talking and listened. I’ll never forget the words that came to mind.

“Write and my word will be spoken.”

I listened for more, but found my own thoughts taking over. I stood up and felt like a huge weight had been lifted from my shoulders. I had my answer.

Now what? . . .

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5