As some other unfortunate souls may be aware, nursing school is a walk in the park. 

Jurassic Park, specifically. 

My late grandmother, a retired nursing professor who was beloved by many (if not all) of her students, once informed me (when I told her I was applying for the program) that throughout my 3.5 years of schooling, I would spend half my time studying and the other half screaming and crying out by the railroad tracks. I can now fully attest to that. One thing was missing though – I had no railroad tracks to run to (there were times I wished I did). Of course, with a profession of great responsibility, they lay great responsibility upon those deciding to make it their lives’ work. Many students decide upon a different career path in the process. 

I had switched majors myself after my first semester in college, when I figured out physical therapy wasn’t my thing. More than halfway through my Bachelor’s degree in Nursing, I was in the midst of the battle, regularly pulling 1-2 all-nighters nearly weekly and surviving on ramen and chips. I remember being an absolute wreck one afternoon, on the floor of my dorm room next to the bunk bed, sobbing and crying out to God because I had bombed a test. Well – at least, according to Nursing School’s definition, I had bombed it. They were really stringent on GPA – to be able to stay in the program, you couldn’t average less than a B- in any one class. You could not get one grade on a test lower than a D+ at any point in the entire semester and stay in…I had just managed a D+ on a test I happened to have been pretty confident about doing well on. (Way too close for comfort.) I was convinced that this was the end of my road in nursing school. I felt lost, embarrassed, and more than anything – I felt like a failure. My grandma had been a PROFESSOR of nursing and worked for this specific school for crying out loud! I should be able to do this. And yet, here I am, on the floor staring up at the ceiling through my tears as I contemplate my uncertain future. Pitiful.

That’s when the story of Jesus sleeping in a boat in the middle of a storm came flooding into my mind. While all the disciples were panicking that they were going to die, Jesus was resting in perfect peace. He wasn’t concerned. He wasn’t troubleshooting the situation with them, trying to help them hoist the mainsail, or drop anchor, or whatever sailors do to survive a storm – He was taking a nap. And when they woke Him up frantically, accusing Him of not caring if they all die, “How can You not be aware of what’s going on right now?! How can You be taking a nap while we’re all fighting for our lives and Yours?!”

…Jesus rose up and said to the wind and waves, “Peace, be still.” 

Just like that, it was over. Every ounce of fear and anxiety, every feeling of impending doom evaporated in a moment. Jesus turned to them and, I imagine with a twinge of a sad smirk at the corner of His lips, said, “you of little faith, why did you doubt?”

The God of the creation was quite literally in the same boat as them, physically within arm’s reach, about to meet whatever fate they were going to meet…and they still thought that boat was going down. They trusted in their own assessment of the situation and seafaring abilities to the point of riding it out until the last minute on their own – not even asking Him for help when they started to get nervous. They didn’t even give Him so much as a gentle tap on the shoulder to say, “um, yes hello, I don’t mean to disturb you but we seem to be taking on some water and we aren’t quite sure what to do next, would you mind giving us a hand?”…they seem to have exhausted every human effort, waited until they were fully convinced of their doom, and then they woke Him up – not to ask for help, but to exclaim in a panic-and-sass-laden accusation, “DO YOU NOT CARE THAT WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE?”

Humans, amiright?

If this isn’t the modus operandi of our entire race! To take matters into our own hands, and then refuse to ask for help until we are certain we’ve completely failed our mission, so as to preserve whatever dignity or pride we can possibly cling to within the vice-like fingers of our mind’s strongest deathgrip…and if we think it’s too late to achieve the desired outcome, those fingers unwrap themselves and start pointing.

“God, You didn’t do anything to help me, do You even care?!”

“Well,” I can imagine Him saying sadly and lovingly, “you never asked for my help.”

As I soaked in the lessons of this passage, I could almost hear Him telling me the same thing. “I brought you safely all the way out here into the middle of this ocean, do you really think I would bring you this far just to let you drown?”

I needed to realize my need for Him. I’d given it all I had on that test, thought I had done well – and the whole time, my perspective was way off. I needed to rely, not on myself and my knowledge or abilities to get through this, but on Him. I needed to realize that I was not the one plowing through these challenging years on foot and making it – He had been carrying me the whole time. I was not some golden child, bred with the genetic makeup to somehow be able to absorb all “nursey” knowledge by osmosis and instantly ace every test. I knew nothing. I needed Him to help me breathe, let alone to understand and commit to memory the complex inner workings of human pathophysiology! 

This valuable lesson has stuck with me – a decade and several life crises later, I may not always catch on right away, but eventually my mind goes back to it. Whenever I have tried to do things on my own, and relied on myself and my own abilities, oh, He’s let me try! And He’s graciously (and protectively) let me fail, like a good parent does – just so I realize how wrong I was. A toddler that’s confident that they can make a cake all by themselves usually makes a mess, and is lucky if they don’t seriously injure themselves in the process! They can do it, but not without the guidance of a loving parent to help them.

Fast forward to the end of nursing school. Yes, by the grace of God, I made it. As I walked down the aisle in my white scrubs with my Florence Nightingale lamp and pin, I looked out the window and saw a perfectly framed, bright, beautiful rainbow. I’d made it, God had gotten me through as promised, the storm was over!

At least that’s how I took it..before life threw me a real stern “not so fast.”

When we graduated, we had to take a few board exams to fully complete the program. One of the tests we had to take was the HESI, an indicator of how well you’ll do on your NCLEX, the RN licensing board exam. You take the HESI once before you graduate, and if you don’t get an 850 or above (the required score for the specific school I went to), then you can still walk in graduation, but you then have to retake it up to twice more after graduation, for a total of three attempts. Once you pass, you get your diploma and go on your way. If you don’t pass, you’re done. You wait an entire year before you can reapply to the program and do it all over again. We were all nervous, but underneath the nerves I was confident that within three chances, I’d be fine. I’d pass at some point.

Except I didn’t.

Not the first time. Not the second time after graduation. Not even the third time.

The more I studied, the lower my score got. 805…758…695…

I was beside myself. I was already coming up with contingency plans for other professions, looking for jobs in retail or as a CNA, grieving over all the wasted debt for a wasted almost-Bachelor’s degree, feeling bad about having to stay under my parents’ roof longer than expected because I couldn’t afford to move out. After my third and last (failed) attempt, I talked to the Director of Nursing, who happened to be a student of my grandmother’s back in the day. She asked me what I thought the problem was. I told her I wasn’t sure…but, I explained, I did have a lot going on at home with my chronically ill mom. After our discussion, she graciously afforded me one more chance. 

It was at this point that I remembered the lesson from before. Jesus was in the boat with me – I had been relying on all my own human effort and sinking lower and lower. So I resolved that this time, I wasn’t going to study. It hadn’t helped at all the last three times. He had promised in His Word, “Seek first the Kingdom of God, and all these things will be added to you,” Matthew 6:33, and that the Holy Spirit could bring things to our remembrance (John 14:26). So, I decided I was going to take Him at His Word. I was going to seek God first – to fill my mind with His words and His thoughts and His will, and leave the results to Him. 

I watched sermons, I sang hymns. I blared Christian music everywhere I went. I praised Him for whatever He was doing and threw all my worries about my future as far in His direction as I could throw…knowing that pass or fail, it was all in His hands. 

One month later, in late July, I drove the two hours back to my school, rented a dorm room for the night and spent every waking moment focusing on God. I took the test the next day, went home, and waited for my results to come in the mail.

I scored 1098. That’s the equivalent of over 95%.

Just like that, fear and uncertainty gave way to JOY and more fortified trust in God that has lasted until this very day. He did it, not me. My career was a result of His providence, not my ability. And with that was the promise that in all things I’d ever encounter, be it in nursing, home life, ministry, friendships, whatever – if I sought Him first, He would always make sure things turned out right.

It’s easy to hear people’s testimonies and think to oneself, “yeah, well, that was them.” This is one of those stories that exemplifies what God is willing to do for all of us if we seek him first. This story can be yours, too. I must admit, I forget sometimes. But once I get to the stage of “the boat filling with water,” God gently reminds me what I learned back in nursing school. If you’re struggling in an area of life right now, or maybe all areas of life, I encourage you to give it a try! You might be surprised by how He comes through for you when you give up control, and let God make something beautiful out of ashes.

“Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think. Ephesians 3:20