By Dr. John E. Morgan

Pastor–Collinsville Baptist Church

God spoke to me.

No, not out loud.

When I graduated from college, I accepted a job with U.S. Steel in Birmingham.  Great rejoicing at having a job offer.  Off I went with a new degree, a new car and a new wife.

I thought I would stay with the company until I retired.  My salary was very good for someone just out of school. I was a foreman, in charge of about twenty men.

Most of the men were really kind and patient with a fresh faced kid just getting started.  Many of them were older than my parents.  I enjoyed working with them.  I enjoyed the challenge of being responsible for what would today be over a half million dollars of new product each day.

What I did not enjoy was upper management.  They ruled by intimidation.  By yelling and finding fault.  Nothing was ever good enough for them.  They placed great pressure on me and other lower level management.  Long hours with little thanks.

Where I did find meaning was working with children at the church that my wife and I attended.  I taught classes on Sunday morning and Sunday night.  My wife joined me with the Sunday night one.  We had no children of our own, so we poured our love into those Birmingham kids.  We would take them on picnics or bring them to our apartment for games.  It was wonderful.

After a while, I began to wonder if God wanted me to become a church worker.  I fought it for several months.  Because it sounded so wonderful.  The idea that I could be paid to teach and work with people and introduce them to Jesus.  That someone would pay me to sit in an office and study the Bible.  I was sure that I was making it up.  Escapism.  Surely God would not call me to do something so wonderful.

It all came to head at a worship service.  I accepted.  I surrendered all.  I cried and cried.  I told my wife who was sitting there with me.  She had known it for months and was just waiting on me to know it.  I was sure I was called, but this was not the time I meant when I said God spoke to me.

We selected the Baptist seminary in Louisville.  I turned in a notice.  And we cried a lot more to leave those children we had come to love in Birmingham.

People told me how brave I was, how committed to leave a safe, good paying job.  I would duck my head and look all humble.  All the time thinking, wow, I get to leave the steel mill and do what I want to do.

We moved, had our first baby boy a month later, our second one a year and a half after that.  Lived in the downstairs of an old house.  I got a job as a Youth Minister.  Paid about a tenth of what I was making before.  And we were rich.  New youth and children and adults to love.  Two boys to cherish and raise.  Life could not be better.

One night as I was nearing the end of seminary, I was coming back from the church by myself on I-64.  I was so happy.  And I thanked God.  I told God He was wonderful.  And that I would gladly go anywhere He sent me.

And then He spoke to me.  Immediately He said, “I want you to go back to U.S. Steel.”

My response?  “Oh, God.  No.”

And He spoke again.  “No, I don’t want you to do that.  I just wanted you to know you did not mean what you were saying about going anywhere.”  He knew the one place I did not want to go.

Humbled, I thanked Him.  For the life He had given us.  And for not sending me back to the Steel Mill.  At least not right then.

I was reminded again that He knows us better than we know us.  And that He is always preparing us for His plans for us.  Our job?  Find His plan.  And surrender.