I do not know what I do not know

A few days ago I was having a conversation with one of my students, a freshman boy. He was telling me about how when he's a senior he's going to own the school, he'll be in charge of everything, blah blah blah. He's kind of a stick-it-to-the-man, anti-establishment, I'm-an-atheist-because-no-one-else-here-is kind of kid.... he loves rock bands and hates school uniforms. I love him, but he rarely ever makes any sort of a logical argument about anything. Yet, the beauty of my job is that I get to help kids like him form logical reasoning for their variety of strongly held beliefs. So, I started asking him a few questions, he answered some, and then I told him I had a phrase for him to memorize and think about, and I'd ask him about it when he was a senior. I said, "You do not know what you do not know."

He just looked at me, blinked a few times, smiled his fantastic smile, and said, "Miss, that doesn't make any sense."

We use that phrase at Grace. It's part of the Leadership Journey curriculum. It pops in to my mind regularly, and today I needed to be reminded of it especially. Sometimes I feel this heavy need - the need to figure it all out, to work out what's best for my life. I take the mindset that God has entrusted me with pieces, and it's up to me to put them all together. Every decision becomes so much more monumental that way - if I don't put the piece in the right place, I mess up God's plan. But, that's so not how it is.

God is putting all of the pieces together in His time and in His pattern. I need to trust that if a piece doesn't go where I want it to, I'm still ok, because every piece goes where God wants it to.

I do not know what I do not know.