Not when it is an emergency situation, thankfully. I am a pro when it comes to quickly moving a group of children away from swarming bees or calling an ambulance for someone who has passed out or telling Ben that he is less than ten feet away from another vehicle.
My decision-making skills become less apparent when I am faced with, well, just about any other opportunity to choose.
For the past twenty-nine years I have driven my father to the brink of insanity when he asks me to pick a restaurant for lunch. I think about the hundreds of options in the area (and narrow it down to the dozen that have good gluten-free low-sodium meals) then I sit with my choices for four or five minutes. Scratching my head, speaking menus out loud. In the end I always come to the same conclusion:
Anything sounds good.
This season presents me with some of the most difficult decisions I have had to make. Not because there are so many options or because it all sounds good. No. Not my usual pick and choose scenarios.
These are difficult because I know the best selection for each one.
And I don't like where the best may lead.
---
I was diagnosed with Congestive Heart Failure last autumn and have made some significant changes to adjust to life with low energy, sore muscles, and fluid build-up. As I navigate this cardiac journey with my doctors and specialists, I choose options they present to me:
I choose to do research and talk to others in order to better understand my body.
I choose to take daily medication to help with swelling and blood pressure.
I choose to record my vitals and check-in with my medical team.
But there is one choice that is incredibly difficult: The choice of employment.
The very first command I was given when I was diagnosed with heart issues in 2014 was to quit my job as a backpacking guide. My cardiologist said I would die on the trail if I continued. I had to call my boss from the doctor's office parking lot to tearfully inform him that my employment had ended.
After we had figured out enough about my health to start feeling like myself again I was ready to get back to work. Which is what I have enjoyed the past few years as a substitute teacher, a Sunday School director, and a Children's Pastor. It is life-giving and healing and wonderful.
But my doctors continue to pose the question of holding a job. They ask if it is necessary for me to work. Give me information about disability. Check in to see what physical and mental stresses come with my job description.
Every time I opt to keep going.
For years I have chosen to devote my time and energy to students, to parents, to ministry. I teach, budget, discipline, train. I love well. I feel this is my God-given calling to work in ministry, to spend my employed hours working with people. This is my best choice.
This was my best choice.
---
Proverbs 16:9 says, "We can make our plans but the Lord determines our steps."
The plans I make and prayers I craft include a healthy heart, increased energy, the ability to do my pastoral job well. I fight and fight to try and make those things happen; to execute my plan. A few days ago, as I lay in bed trying to force my fatigued body to rise, I heard it:
You are fighting for the wrong things.
I have been fighting and pushing my plan--as good as it is--without any consideration of other options. Without remembering that God will consider my plans and can offer a better selection.
The children and families I walk with do an incredible job working alongside and supporting a fatigued fighter. I appreciate every step of growth and joy and heartache that comes with this role. I love these people with my whole oversized heart. And I now see that they will be blessed by someone whose plan lines up with the one I have made. They will be blessed by someone whose steps are leading right to them.
And so a choice has been made.
A painful, tear-filled, good choice.
I choose to leave my role as the Associate Pastor of North Fresno Church.
I choose to allow my body and mind to rest and recover.
I choose to follow God into whatever big and beautiful and unexpected plans are best for me.
And I choose to do it well.
