Solveig looking at Jon's neurology textbook while he studies
Applying to med school is a flurried, grueling task. The first application alone took like 30+ hours to complete, and then we had the all-important Personal Statement: see, Jon is up against a multitude of 22-year-olds who's only responsibility is blowing everyone else out of the water with their strong grades, millions of volunteer hours, and high MCAT scores. We know Jon is at an academic disadvantage because he has a family to take care of, so we are counting on our story to be compelling enough to convince med school admission boards.
After all the dust settled from the primary application, the offers for secondaries came in. More essays and more paperwork, and this time letters of recommendation too, which means putting together a portfolio for each letter writer, sorting and organizing the letter requirements for each school (because of course they aren’t all the same), and writing thank-you's. And then there's requesting transcripts from the three colleges Jon's attended so far and sending passport copies to the international schools. Oh, yes, and don't forget the application fees - we had to wait to send Jon's secondaries until we could afford it.
A short time after finishing Jon's secondaries I started having a crisis of belief. Jon and I are quite sure God pushed us into the medical field, and again quite sure He pushed Jon into the specific direction of physician. I'd become cavalier about all the chaos, shrugging it off as "God has a plan." I had this attitude of "Welp, if God wants us to pursue medicine, Jon will get into med school. If He doesn't, then Jon won't."
But then a friend suggested, "What if Jon does get into med school and it's still not what God wants you to do?" Crap. How would we know that? I realized then that we had been relying on circumstances alone to guide our life. I'd been expecting God to open and close doors, and that it was our job only to recognize the closings and find the openings. But that takes two crucial things out of the picture: our free will and God's power. It takes away our burden of responsibility, expecting God to close the door when we're doing the wrong thing, making it virtually impossible to continue, so that we only ever head in the right direction, never having to make a decision for ourselves.
And then, what of God's power to make the impossible possible? I think of all the examples in the Bible where God asked people to do impossible things - Moses to confront Phaoroah, David to fight Goliath, Gideon unmanned against the Midianites. All of them faced closed doors but God made it happen anyway.
So we've been waiting and waiting for the big answer: where will Jon get accepted? We've received no rejection letters or interview invitations. Even though we are weary of waiting, I have realized that God may be withholding direction from us right now because He wants us to seek Him more intently. It is more important that we have a relationship with God than what it is we can do for Him. It is through that relationship that we will know what to do, not circumstances.
And so, we wait.
After all the dust settled from the primary application, the offers for secondaries came in. More essays and more paperwork, and this time letters of recommendation too, which means putting together a portfolio for each letter writer, sorting and organizing the letter requirements for each school (because of course they aren’t all the same), and writing thank-you's. And then there's requesting transcripts from the three colleges Jon's attended so far and sending passport copies to the international schools. Oh, yes, and don't forget the application fees - we had to wait to send Jon's secondaries until we could afford it.
A short time after finishing Jon's secondaries I started having a crisis of belief. Jon and I are quite sure God pushed us into the medical field, and again quite sure He pushed Jon into the specific direction of physician. I'd become cavalier about all the chaos, shrugging it off as "God has a plan." I had this attitude of "Welp, if God wants us to pursue medicine, Jon will get into med school. If He doesn't, then Jon won't."
But then a friend suggested, "What if Jon does get into med school and it's still not what God wants you to do?" Crap. How would we know that? I realized then that we had been relying on circumstances alone to guide our life. I'd been expecting God to open and close doors, and that it was our job only to recognize the closings and find the openings. But that takes two crucial things out of the picture: our free will and God's power. It takes away our burden of responsibility, expecting God to close the door when we're doing the wrong thing, making it virtually impossible to continue, so that we only ever head in the right direction, never having to make a decision for ourselves.
And then, what of God's power to make the impossible possible? I think of all the examples in the Bible where God asked people to do impossible things - Moses to confront Phaoroah, David to fight Goliath, Gideon unmanned against the Midianites. All of them faced closed doors but God made it happen anyway.
So we've been waiting and waiting for the big answer: where will Jon get accepted? We've received no rejection letters or interview invitations. Even though we are weary of waiting, I have realized that God may be withholding direction from us right now because He wants us to seek Him more intently. It is more important that we have a relationship with God than what it is we can do for Him. It is through that relationship that we will know what to do, not circumstances.
And so, we wait.
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