So I found out some big news on Monday: I've been offered a position at Epic Systems in Madison, WI. I will be a staff accountant for them, most likely working in their GL department (which focuses on the general accounting functions such as reporting, working with their fixed assets, exploring how their international expansion affects their company, etc).
Let me give you the background of this and just how God works in crazy ways. So as most of you probably know, I felt called to leave staff with Crusade a couple of months ago. Obviously, that was a hard decision but I just felt confident that the Lord had something else in store. So...I left with the ambition to have an impact in the accounting field. Speaking with several staff during the leaving process, they had some concerns since this obviously isn't exactly easy to do. But, I did feel like this is where God had me.
I began the job search, and I really had no "luck". I applied for many, many, many jobs and never heard back from any of them. A bit into the process, I had a company (Epic) find my resume and send me and e-mail saying that I should apply. I never had any intentions to leave the state, so I applied just for the fact to just not shut any doors. At this point, I really had no interest in the position, but I did note to myself that they found me and God could be using this opportunity.
It was a 2 month process to finally get the job offer. Through that time, I ended up getting more and more excited about this opportunity. There are 3,200 employees, and they are just currently building even more to their huge campus (It looks like a University if you didn't know any better). To make things even better: They hire many recent college grads. How cool is God to be able to provide an environment that seems like a college atmosphere but yet still be able to have an impact in the accounting field. Plus, the offer was very nice...so I can become a sender of various missionaries as I can help support them financially.
So God is faithful to provide through crazy things when you follow where he has you. Sometimes, he does it in funny ways that you don't expect.
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
The Ragamuffin Gospel: Grace
On Sunday, my church had its annual recognition of graduates. Of course, my nice parents signed me up for it, even though I graduated 6 months ago. So, there we sat: 7 high school graduates and 7 college graduates (4 of whom were in the same grade and grew up in the church together). They had us go and get recognized, and they gave us a gift: The Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan Manning.
It is unfortunate that we grow up in a society that makes it difficult to truly love and embrace the gift of grace. We are taught from a young age that we have to fight to earn everything. We are taught that we should never take free gifts from people and how we need to learn to support ourselves as soon as possible. I'll give a brief example. As I did support raising this past semester, a hard thing for me was to accept the gifts of different people that I met with. My natural thought was "I don't deserve this, and they are just giving money because they feel like they have to." I had to kick myself and turn this around because God works in people's lives and they want to financially support the mission of Christ, otherwise they wouldn't agree to supporting financially at all. In other words, it's easy for me to look at things and say I don't deserve it because I haven't earned it, and it is hard to take the free gift.
The term "Grace" is used in many contexts these days. Michael Jordan was graceful as he drove to the basket. The son was a disgrace because he didn't get A's on his report card. We use this term as us doing something. In a similar way, we relate our Spiritual walks into what we do. We talk about how we have to work to earn a closer relationship with the Lord, through spiritual disciplines. Our idea of "worship" is singing songs and what we do in that. These are great things, but so often we make all this stuff about ourselves and what we are doing to try to reach the Lord. The beauty of grace, and the Gospel message, is that this means nothing. We don't have to be the "All-Star" Christian that we all try to pursue being.
Let's take a look in Luke. In vs 15-17, people are bringing their children to Jesus and Jesus replies "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it." In vs 18-30, a rich ruler comes to Jesus and asks him "What must I do to inherit eternal life?" (Note: Notice its all about what the man needs to do, which again shows how so often we make things about how we can earn it). He mentions how he has kept the commandments and Jesus tells him that he needs to sell all his possessions. Later, the crowd asks Jesus who can be saved, and he replies "What is impossible with men is possible with God." (Note: See Jesus switching it up and making it about the Lord rather than us)
I think theres a reason that Luke includes these stories back to back. The little children are embraced, while the rich man is told to fix some things. Children have no way of doing anything to earn the embrace. Luke, I believe, is really showing that Jesus wanted us to see that we can't earn anything, but God's work is all we need. We need to be like children where we aren't trying and working to earn anything, but we are just embracing the free gifts given to us. Children love when they are fed and cared to by others, why can't we love when a free gift, like God's grace, is given to us?
It is unfortunate that we grow up in a society that makes it difficult to truly love and embrace the gift of grace. We are taught from a young age that we have to fight to earn everything. We are taught that we should never take free gifts from people and how we need to learn to support ourselves as soon as possible. I'll give a brief example. As I did support raising this past semester, a hard thing for me was to accept the gifts of different people that I met with. My natural thought was "I don't deserve this, and they are just giving money because they feel like they have to." I had to kick myself and turn this around because God works in people's lives and they want to financially support the mission of Christ, otherwise they wouldn't agree to supporting financially at all. In other words, it's easy for me to look at things and say I don't deserve it because I haven't earned it, and it is hard to take the free gift.
The term "Grace" is used in many contexts these days. Michael Jordan was graceful as he drove to the basket. The son was a disgrace because he didn't get A's on his report card. We use this term as us doing something. In a similar way, we relate our Spiritual walks into what we do. We talk about how we have to work to earn a closer relationship with the Lord, through spiritual disciplines. Our idea of "worship" is singing songs and what we do in that. These are great things, but so often we make all this stuff about ourselves and what we are doing to try to reach the Lord. The beauty of grace, and the Gospel message, is that this means nothing. We don't have to be the "All-Star" Christian that we all try to pursue being.
Let's take a look in Luke. In vs 15-17, people are bringing their children to Jesus and Jesus replies "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it." In vs 18-30, a rich ruler comes to Jesus and asks him "What must I do to inherit eternal life?" (Note: Notice its all about what the man needs to do, which again shows how so often we make things about how we can earn it). He mentions how he has kept the commandments and Jesus tells him that he needs to sell all his possessions. Later, the crowd asks Jesus who can be saved, and he replies "What is impossible with men is possible with God." (Note: See Jesus switching it up and making it about the Lord rather than us)
I think theres a reason that Luke includes these stories back to back. The little children are embraced, while the rich man is told to fix some things. Children have no way of doing anything to earn the embrace. Luke, I believe, is really showing that Jesus wanted us to see that we can't earn anything, but God's work is all we need. We need to be like children where we aren't trying and working to earn anything, but we are just embracing the free gifts given to us. Children love when they are fed and cared to by others, why can't we love when a free gift, like God's grace, is given to us?
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