my first year at liberty i lived in an apartment. it was a two bedroom apartment on the second floor of a two floor complex. there were four apartments upstairs and four apartments downstairs. it was your typical apartment complex. at the time, the only work i was doing was an occasional appraisal with my dad. i was a sophomore in college and i was strapped big-time for money.

back then, all the way back in the spring of 2006, i drove a jeep wrangler. on this particular day, the weather was nice and i had the top off and the doors off and had my music cranked up way too loud. it was a good day. i was in a good mood. when i got home from school that day, i parked and walked to my apartment. there, at the bottom of the steps, was a wad of money. i picked it up and walked upstairs to my apartment.

i counted it.

it was $347.

i asked my roommate if it was his. he said it wasn’t. i went across the breezeway to some friends of ours who lived there and asked them if it was any of theirs. it wasn’t.

i’d asked everyone that i knew in my building and no one claimed it. i could’ve easily kept the money and no one would’ve been the wiser for it.

but i knew that wasn’t right.

so i went around and knocked on the doors of the other two apartments upstairs. the money didn’t belong to anyone there. i went downstairs and started knocking and asking. through three apartments, no one claimed it. i got to the fourth apartment and the guy that answered the door said it wasn’t his. i thought that maybe i was lucking into a big amount of money. before i left though, he said he should ask his roommate if he’d lost any money. come to find out, the roommate had lost some, and it was exactly $347. that was his rent for that month.

i never really talked to that guy anymore over the next few months i lived there. he would’ve never known that i kept his money had i not given it back to him. it would’ve been extremely easy to keep it.

but what is easy isn’t always what is right.

i graduate in may. i’ll have my master of arts in student ministry. i’ll also only be four classes away from a master of arts in evangelism and church planting. the job that i’m working is a graduate assistant position. it requires me to be in school to work there. they had offered it to me for another year if i wanted it. it was completely up to me.

i was left with a decision to make: do i graduate and go look for a job or do i keep the job that i have now for another year?

the economy sucks right now. most places aren’t hiring. next summer the economy should be a little better. having two master’s degrees would be pretty cool. i’d be more qualified in some people’s eyes if i got the second degree. i wouldn’t have to pay for school. i don’t hate my job. i don’t have much money but i have enough.

i told my boss i’d let him know of my plans by the end of the month. i’m only working part of the day on thursday and then i’ll be out of town until late sunday night. my last full day of the month was today. i basically had to let him know what i was going to do today.

the easy thing to do would’ve been to keep the job, get the second degree for free, and then go on from there.

but i don’t think that would’ve been the right thing to do.

so i told my boss that i wasn’t planning on taking the second year. i’m pretty sure he already knew just from being around me, but today made it official.

i have no clue what the next step is. i’m constantly contacting churches and getting information and trying to move in the right direction. for me, this was a complete leap of faith. some people would say that i’m absolutely crazy to turn down a sure-thing in this economy. some people would say that this is a dumb move for me. some would probably even go further than that.

but sometimes the easy thing to do isn’t the right thing to do.

i feel like for the last year and a half god’s had me back in the pits working on me and getting me built right so that when the green flag drops, i’m ready to go. i think that he’s finally set a race day and it’s sometime this summer. i don’t know where, and i don’t know when, but that’s what i feel.

i know this post has been a lot about me, but if you’re reading it, i want you to think about the idea of “what is easy isn’t always what is right.”

i don’t know your situation. i don’t know what’s going on in your life. maybe you’re in a relationship and you’re doing things that you don’t think you should, but it’s convenient and fun. maybe you’re in that stage where you’ve been partying a little bit and know that you shouldn’t but you don’t want to stop hanging out with your friends. maybe you are at one of thousands of other points in life.

you know inside of you what the right thing is and i can pretty much guarantee you it isn’t going to be the easiest thing.

it’s probably going to be pretty hard.

it’s probably going to be pretty scary.

it’s probably going to require quite a bit of faith.

but in the end, if it’s the right thing, it’s most certainly be worth it.

say your prayers and take your vitamins.

have a nice day.

-jonathan