I guess nobody saw me. I don't really know and I didn't really care. I was wondering what was going on. I had moved to New Orleans to live in a dorm and go to seminary. I got down there and knew no one, although I did run into a friend of a friend that became a friend. I jumped into two summer classes that were intensives or rush courses to get through required hours. Not wise for a newcomer. I did alright but the whole experience was fairly overwhelming. One day it got the best of me and I started wandering around asking God questions. I finally rested on a bench in a courtyard behind the president's office. I looked up at the sky and asked Him if I had been right: Had God's call for me to go to N.O. for seminary led me to feel this loneliness? Or did I feel it because I was wrong? I laid it all out there before Him and asked Him to make known all that He would have for me. I guess nobody saw me sitting there. I bet a lot of guys have sat in a similiar spot on a similiar campus. However, at the time that was no concern to me.
I did not know that day that within 6 months I would be pastoring a church in a town where I would meet my loving and beautiful wife. I did not know that when the fall semester started back I would meet lifelong friends. I did not know that it was that day that probably led me to see and hear the direction of God as clearly as I have time and time again. I never would have thought that it was that day that I now include among my few spiritual markers, my Ebenezers, my memorial stones of faith. The day I thought was my lowest has actually been more of my highest, because I learned to look to Him and wait.
I thought about that this morning when I read about Jesus talking to Nathanael. John 1:48-49- Nathanael said to him (Jesus), "How do you know me?" Jesus answered him, "Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you." Nathanael answered him, "Rabbi, you are the Son of God!"
I don't know the story of the fig tree or when he was sitting there. I don't need to. Nathanael knew it. It was a poignant moment in his life. Maybe a time he thought no one saw him under that fig tree. It was big though because when Christ brought it up, it sank straight to the heart. No longer did he question who Christ was or what He knew or what "good He was" (v.46). He just knew from that day forward. The fig tree moments...the seminary courtyard moments...they will do that to you.
I hope today that if you are in a fig tree moment that God will bring you clarity. If you have had fig tree moments and look back on them as faith builders, that you will thank the Lord for being there. Being there, even when you thought He wasn't.
We are headed home today after a week in SC. Please pray for us as we travel.
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