An uncertain tomorrow

It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows; for so He gives His beloved sleep. (Psalm 127:2)

I guess I've been feeling petty vain the last few days then. I've been up both late and rising early, my stress feels tangible inside as the knots behind my sternum have been present the last few days.

Today is Wed., and there are very strong rumors that my company (that I've now been with for 1.5 years) is going to lay off people tomorrow. They have already done two smaller rounds prior to the holidays in which about 40 people (out of our 700 or so) were let go and I felt very bad for them. As someone who was laid off a few years back and struggled to find a new job that actually paid me some respect and granted me an 'okay' salary, it's not a situation I am too eager to repeat anytime soon.

The problem now is that a coworker planted a seed in my head the other day that was innocent in nature, but began to fester within my being into something that's been now robbing me of my sleep and focus. It got so bad at one point last night that I was seriously thinking of popping a Clonzapen or having a stiff drink. In the end I did neither. I was able to find an older resume of mine however and spent some time updating it in perhaps a knee-jerk reaction and posted it to Monster.com last night. I think I'll have to spend a little bit more time in tweaking it and re posting it so it looks a little better.

Anyway, the rumored day for the layoff is tomorrow, Thursday, and I wouldn't be lying if I wasn't scared. My wife and I are not in a financial place right now where losing my job is going to be easy by any means. As a matter of fact we curtailed our usual Christmas spending way back and even informed loved ones not to expect much from us this year. We haven't gone to many places as of late or done any fixups about the house. Yeah, it's been a bit tight this year.

I took the chance to speak with my current boss yesterday to 'feel out' the situation, and like the master poker player he says he's not, didn't reveal one iota of information. For every positive thing he may have alluded to, there was an equal not so positive thing to balance it. Needless to say, I didn't feel much better afterwards and perhaps a few more questions were raised inside my head about my future and my career than when I first walked in.

Tomorrow is payday, and it may or may not be my last check with the company, but I guess I'll know within the next 34 hours (from when I write this).

But what plagues me just as much of the uncertainty of my job is the uncertainty of my faith and trust in the Lord. Once again, I have allowed the enemy to steal any peace, joy, and calmness in my life and replaced it with stress, anxiety, frustration, etc. All this flies in direct opposition in which Christ asks us to trust in Him, to turn over all burdens to Him, to not worry about the future for He will provide and take care of all His children.

Thank you Lord for keeping your future promises to us despite my own inability to sometimes to accept them on faith alone. Your will be done, and if it is not good news for me tomorrow, please let me have learned from the previous time on how to handle things in my life.