God Cares about the Desires of our Hearts

I was out of work for eight months, but now I have a job. How I came to have that job, and other aspects that have to do with it, is, I believe, a story of God's incredible goodness.

I was laid off from Microsoft, where I had worked as a linguist for eleven years, in May 2010. (During the time I'd been at Microsoft my husband had become pastor of a tiny church, and we had left the large church where I had been a member of a huge choir for fifteen years.) Because there aren't any other linguistic tech jobs here in the Seattle area for native speakers of English, and the academic field has moved on since I was last in that world, I started looking for an admin-type job. But I was overqualified and also too old. So eight months went by fruitlessly until I was contacted out of the blue by my former choir director, Scott, who is head of Worship and Music at our former large church. Scott asked me to work as his interim administrative assistant. Eventually he offered me the job permanently.

Meanwhile, last fall when I heard that that choir was going to present Mendelssohn's oratorio Elijah as a concert, I had asked Scott if I could sing in it. He had explained that many people would like to sing just for the concert, and he had to limit the choir for it to Sunday morning singers. I understood that, but was bitterly disappointed, since I had wanted to do Elijah for years, and didn't know if I'd ever get another chance. My husband, Jim, can attest to the fact that I often complained to him ("Can you believe they would do Elijah after we left?").

So after I started working at that church, I asked Scott if I could just rehearse with the choir, and he said yes. That was plenty good enough for me; just to sing the amazing words with other believers was wonderful. I had been singing with a secular chorus in the interim, and I remember the thrill I felt at the first rehearsal back with the church choir, as I sang with other believers the words from Elijah: "Our God is one Lord, and we will have no other gods before the Lord." But then about a month before the concert Scott invited me to join them for the concert, too, since I was on staff, and that was icing on the cake.

Here's how I think God was working in this: I could not for the life of me find a job, though I was diligently applying to jobs right and left. And then Scott contacted me with a job I did not even expect, working with people I highly respect and enjoy, at a familiar church, and in the department of that church that I was most at home in. That in itself shows God's care for me, to provide for me a job that is not only just a job, but one that makes me happy. But that's not all. God took thought for the desires of my heart--to sing in Elijah. Such an unimportant thing, yet it meant so much to me. I can still hardly believe that God would work this out, yet He did. He cared that much about such a little detail in my life.

What an amazing God!

There are more unknowns in Jim's and my future. They may not be wrapped up as neatly as this. But I know for sure that if God cared for me this way, that this is one more piece of evidence that He is a God to be trusted. We can go forward secure in His love.

A Dog's Attitude

This is a post I wrote on April 28, 2007:


Friday was a good day: I got the magenta tray at the cafeteria.

The cafeteria in our building at work has lots of gray and yellow trays, some brown ones, and a few blue ones, but there is only one magenta tray. Since pink is my favorite color, I always hope that I will get that tray, and when I do, I really enjoy it.

Maybe if you're reading this, you're thinking, "What's the big deal about what color your cafeteria tray is?" True, it's not a big deal. But I like to take pleasure in all sorts of little things. Savoring them makes my day more enjoyable.

The other day I once again came across a line in The Fellowship of the Ring that I really like. Gandalf the wizard has just told the hobbit Sam that he is going to accompany Frodo on his journey, which means that Sam will get to see Elves, something he's always longed to do.

"Me, sir!" cried Sam, springing up like a dog invited for a walk.

I love the image because it immediately conveys a great deal of excitement. Yet when we think about it, what are dogs so excited about? Just a walk! But they get a great deal of pleasure out of it.

My dog Hana waits every morning for me to sit down with my bowl of cereal, because she knows I will give her two pieces of it. It's only two pieces of cereal, usually Cheerios, so not a big deal, but to her it's a very happy moment.

Dogs are optimists, too. Every time I prepare a meal, Hana thinks, despite the mountain of previous experience, that this time, maybe the meal is going to be for her. And her tail is almost always ready to wag; she expects good things out of life.

I think that we can learn a lot from dogs' attitude. With God as our father, we can expect good things out of life, too. That's not to say that everything will always be rosy. But we can know that he is with us and will see us through any hard times. I found this out a year ago as I was going through cancer. God didn't make the cancer magically disappear, but he did sustain me as I underwent surgery, chemo, and radiation. I knew that in the long run, whatever the prognosis (mine ended up being good), God was going to be there in the end.

And then there were those little things, like the magenta cafeteria tray. God put a lot of them in my life, and when I looked for them, I found them. Things like the kindness of fellow co-workers, or a daffodil that the radiation oncology center gave me. It made a big difference to how I experienced a year of cancer treatments. I could have looked for the unpleasant, difficult things, or I could have just not looked for anything. But instead I looked for the little fun or nice things, and they were there to be found, and so my days were more pleasant and enjoyable than they might otherwise have been.

What's more, because I found those little good things, I was able to give thanks to God. I knew he was there helping me get through a bad time. In fact, I felt his presence more closely during that cancer year than I ever had before. That in itself brought joy to me beyond what I can describe.

I know it sounds silly to say I had a good day because I got the magenta tray at the cafeteria. But I have a fun life. And a lot of it is because I take pleasure in the little things.