“So sorry, Mr. Denny, you picked a bad decade to get a seminary teaching position in Hebrew and Aramaic, there’s no openings since nobody is retiring!” I was devastated. These were the words of my professor after I told him that I had been rejected by every place I had applied! Four years of intense work in ancient near eastern languages at the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, all for naught! Seriously God?
I had passed all of my doctoral qualifying exams and was already researching and writing my dissertation. I was translating a newly discovered Syriac commentary on the book of Deuteronomy, which manuscript had been found in Turkey by my professor Dr. Arthur Vööbus, who was world famous for all of his biblical manuscript discoveries.
I had even presented a scholarly paper at the Society of Biblical Literature in New York City where Old Testament scholars came up to me congratulating me on a great presentation. Yet … why could I not locate a teaching position? The answer: God’s Path, Not Mine!
Doubts flooded my soul. I took a job at a local 1100-bed Chicago hospital where my pastoral background allowed me to help angry patients/staff deal with high stress encounters, sometimes I had to physically separate patients from doctors to bring peace and resolution. Every Friday I met with the hospital legal and risk management vice presidents to discuss the liability issues which had occurred in the prior week. At one such meeting, one of the VP’s said, “Denny, you’re really good at this, why don’t you go to law school?”
I had two master’s degrees and had just finished four years of incredibly difficult study in northwest semitic philology, the last thing I wanted was more schooling. I said, “No thanks” to which he said, “the hospital will pay 100% of your tuition” to which I said, “why not!” What started was my journey down God’s Path, Not Mine!
I gave God every chance to push me off the road of becoming a lawyer! Not really preparing for the law school admission test, not taking the courses seriously since I arrogantly viewed law school courses as unchallenging compared to my doctoral University of Chicago courses! And when it came time after graduation to sit for the Illinois bar exam, well, I didn’t even sign up for it. I went to the exam in hopes of a walk-on spot, and there was ONLY one such spot available.
Weeks later I opened an envelope and learned that I had failed the Illinois bar exam. I met with one of the bar examiners for a review of my exam answers so I could learn how to pass it the next time. The Illinois bar exam had two parts: first, the multi-state multiple choice test which I had passed; and second, the essay test which I had failed by one point! Each essay question had a perfect score of 10 points and the examiner laid my handwritten exam booklet on one side of the table in front of me while he placed a “perfect 10-point answer” for each question on the table so I could compare my answers to the perfect answers. The perfect answers had been picked out of the 1000’s submitted for the exam.
After comparing my essay answers with a couple of the perfect answers I came upon something which blew my mind. The handwriting on one “perfect 10-point answer” looked familiar! My eyes flew back and forth between my answer and the perfect answer! They were identical. I hollered out and the examiner came into the room, “look here, this perfect answer is MY answer!” He said, “Oh my goodness, this has never happened before!” I asked him meekly, “Can’t you find it in your heart to give me one more point?” He smiled, “No, but I am sure you will pass the bar exam the next time.” Rather than give up and change direction, that encounter emboldened me, and I did indeed pass the bar exam the next time. Confident that God wanted me to become a lawyer, today after almost 40 years of helping my clients seek justice, I savor God’s Path, Not Mine!
And The Merton Prayer has been my touchstone all of these years, since even when I “have no idea where I am going” I know that “God is ever with me.” Even when we fail and get detoured from the path we are on, you and I both can gain great solace and comfort knowing with confidence God’s Path, Not Mine!
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The Merton Prayer 