The Challenge to Grow
When God introduces creative tension into our lives by calling us to break camp, abandon the security and comfort of the status quo, and embark in perilous freedom on a new exodus, our insecurity and procrastination may focus only on the darker implications of the challenge and plunge us anew into unhealthy guilt. Stubbornly to stand still when the Lord is clearly challenging us to growth is hardheartedness, infidelity, and a dangerous lack of trust. But to start trekking across the desert impulsively without the guidance of the cloud and the fire is reckless folly. When God's call is not clarified and the inner voice remains indistinct, our restlessness and interior disquiet may be signaling a new exodus into greater openness, vulnerability, and compassion, a deeper purity of heart, a transformed mind and spirit. The landscape of the American church is littered with burned-out bodies and abortive ministries born of unhealthy guilt and fear of resisiting God's will.
Who will acquit us from guilt? Who will free us from the bondage of projectionsim, perfectionism, and moralism? Who will rewrite the script? Thanks be to God for Jesus Christ our Lord!
When you see the ark of the covenant of the LORD your God, and the priests, who are Levites, carrying it, you are to move out from your positions and follow it. Then you will know which way to go, since you have never been this way before.
Joshua 3:3-4
I want to be the kind of person who embraces growth and loves the opportunity. I am in theory; in practicality, I much prefer being told I am already brilliant and doing things perfectly. Sigh... I have discovered that the real connotation of "growth" in my head means I am not measuring up and that I have dangerous, humiliating deficits. Not exactly great soil for allowing God to bring beautiful change. And I still have a little of the old, "I'll get it right then show you how well I can do, Lord." lingering around. You know, the idea that I can just "gut out" the tough moments and work really hard to bring about change. What hooey. I have no guts!
That's been one of the most wonderful things to accept--I have no guts. I have nothing naturally existing in me that can be brave and muscle myself any nearer to the greater heart, the deeper compassion, the longer patience, and the better service I want in my life. Nope--no guts.
But I have the Holy Spirit. And He that lives in me will keep a watch on the cloud and fire and will know which way to go, will give strength and wisdom and love for the journey and change, and make it possible to be brave in the unknown.
Lord, may it be so.
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