There's a particular coffee shop where I spent the majority of my early college years . The coffee shop that I hopelessly dreamed of my future in at the 3 seat table with the power outlet that doesn't work on the right side of the relatively large floor plan. I sat here day after day meeting new people, having peculiar conversations, and hoping. I sat waiting for the next opportunity to spark up a friendship with just a few sentences. As naive as it may seem, I think I learned some of my sweetest life lessons in that shop, from total and complete strangers who just happened to pick their choice of coffee in the same place.
While many of my friends were at major universities and colleges, I stayed home and went to community college. I came and went quickly to and from my classes at the campus across town; and then hurried to my second home, the coffee shop. The baristas knew me and expected me to show up. I looked forward to the people I would see that happened to drop by at just the same time that I did each day.
I didn't just interact and stay busy though; I spent a lot of time hoping and dreaming and wondering. Everything stirred inside of me- I wondered where'd I be in 5 years or so; what on earth I'd be able to do with the education I was getting, and who I'd be spending my time with. I dreamed of opening my own coffee shop one day, of having the determination to go to school for something ambitious like a nurse or a successful business leader. [I think I saw a lot of them come through the shop and I craved what they had because they looked like they had it all together.] I dreamed of who "my people" were then and who they would be down the road. I dreamed of the places I would travel and experiences I would have. I dreamed of a man who would care for me and love me and value me, every part of me.
I have seen the Lord change me, I have seen seasons that were brutally cold and some marvelously perfect. The times I sat sitting in the shop, I cherish, because the Lord was planting those desires in me- and I was so ecstatic to see how they would come to fruition. The Lord used and uses each day to teach and mold and create. I look back and see what a process He used in me and continues to. I love the way I have seen Jesus reveal himself to me over time, and that it just continues to happen- and it won't cease. Colossians 1:27 says, "To them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory." We can't know or expect or understand what is coming for us when we are in Christ, in His sweet glory and riches.
I started a few jobs after I finally graduated that I would start and grow tired of and I still made semi-regular appearances in the shop over the next 2[ish] years. Finally, a job in Norfolk took me the opposite way of the coffee shop and frequenting it on a regular basis. I grew very familiar with a up before the sun drive to Norfolk and commute home after the sun had gone down. The days turned long and time flew by in ways I'd heard of but never imagined. Months passed and today, close to one entire year later I sit here at that same 3 seat table on the right side of the shop. I have experience in a job I would have never seen myself in but relates so ironically with my degree. I have some of "my people" in my life now who were there then, some have moved away, passed on, some changed; and so many have come from unexpected places back when I thought them into being. I've got a ring on my finger that was given to me by the man better than my dreams and whom I love so immeasurably. I am a month away from packing up and traveling 15 hours away with that man, the one I dreamed of, to embark on an adventure I couldn't have ever imagined seeing happen. Oh, and they changed the outlet next to the table. It works now.
