My Work Found Me

           “The same is true when it comes to finding the work that matters to you. Sometimes we can find our work in the larger world—in faraway places with a burning need. But sometimes, like Reverend Weary, we find it in the place we thought to run from. The biblical story of Jonah is a familiar and apt metaphor for how we find our work—or how our work finds us. When we run to the thing we fear, the problem that keeps us up at night, sometimes we find the work we were meant to do all along. When it comes to race in America, I hope that one day we, as individuals and as a country, run right into that scary place and free ourselves of its burden at last" (Moore 114-115).

 This passage in particular stood out to me because it highlighted a need in a place that is often ignored or feared. All too often I hear stories of my peers venturing out into third world countries in order to fulfill their lifelong desire to make a difference in the lives of children and their families that are impoverished. I feel as though this particular portion of the text is speaking to me because I once had similar desires. I used to dream of working abroad, while those interests are still present, I find it more logical to approach the issues in my immediate reach.

I now have the opportunity to work in a city that was considered extremely violent and out of control just a few months ago. It wasn’t necessarily a location nor title that I thought I would have if you had asked me a year ago but this is the exact site of a “burning need” and quite bluntly the place I ‘thought to run from”. I felt that it was God’s calling for me to select this position and this text is telling me that sometimes your work will find you and not the other way around.

The final sentence of this excerpt highlights a method of finding the need and meeting it. I sense that my current position as a SuperKids Camp Counselor is doing exactly that. Every day that I wake I am signing up for a mini battle. Hardships in the form of disruptive or non-compliant students are thrown at me but in this position I am to keep my composure, be consistent, try to understand the exact need and then work around it to resolve it.