Perfectly (Not) According to Plan

Dear Person Who Thinks They Have Everything Under Control,

Welcome to the start of your dream! It’s still hard for me to believe that I am fulfilling every step of my second-grade checklist: I attend UA; I’m studying to become a school librarian; I even drive a little red VW Bug with eyelashes. These achievements are great, of course, but that does not mean my life has gone according to plan.

Don’t worry. This letter is not meant for you to worry about your plan. My mom came into college wanting to be a high school math teacher, graduated, and has been doing so for almost 30 years.

However, don’t be so dead-set on your plans that you refuse to listen to God’s will. So many of the truest times of joy in my college career have been those that I could have never planned.

Even though I am living out my dream, life at college is much different than I imagined. I dreamed about being a Capstone Woman and that every person I met my first week would be my tight-knit group for the next 65 years. These dreams were just that—dreams. But what I have now is so much better. I have two different jobs where I get to welcome people to campus and talk about my passions. I don’t still know everyone from my first week, but there are some I do, and now I have even more people I consider some of my best friends. My relationships, even after just two years, are deeper than any I could have imagined.

Jeremiah 29:11 says, “’For I know the plans I have for you’, says the Lord. ‘Plans to prosper and not to harm.’” This is something that took me a long time to come to terms with—submitting to His plan and not to mine. And this isn’t just me. I have a friend who is finishing her degree in something she is not even sure she wants to continue to use the rest of her life, and another who has changed her major eight times. But these things, ultimately, don’t matter, and we can rest in that.

One of the sweetest promises in the Bible comes right after that classic verse:

“’In those days, when you pray, I will listen. When you seek for me wholeheartedly, I will be found by you. I will be found by you’ says the Lord”. // Jeremiah 29:12-13

It sounds like such a typical “Christian” answer to pray, but it is so powerful! When we seek Him, He will never let go of us and will reveal His plan in His time.

I can’t wait to meet all of you in the fall!

Love,

Faryn

Faryn Fryer // @farynberry

Junior // Collaborative Special Education

Columbiana, AL