bravery

given that 2009 is my self-proclaimed year of conquering irrational fears, when i came across this Madeliene L'Engle quote, i knew it was a keeper.

comfort & safety

at tonight's small group, we discussed chapter eight of crazy love, profile of the obsessed. the second point was one that we had a lengthy discussion on, and it still sticks in my mind. chan writes,

people who are obsessed with Jesus aren't consumed with their personal safety and comfort above all else. obsessed people care more about God's kingdom coming to this earth than their own lives being shielded from pain or distress.

do i care more about my personal safety than i do my discipleship? do i value discipleship over my comfort? sadly, the answer i would verbalize would be seldom seen in the way my life plays out.

we talked about safety from a traveling point of view, but for me, there are bigger issues that all stem back to fear. for instance, PORTICO is sending a missions team to poland this summer, and i have been considering my involvement on the team. it's been over four years since i did missions in poland, and the thought of helping a church plant that meets in cafes, just so much appeals to me!

but the fear somehow always creeps back in... regardless of how many missions trips i have been on and how God has provided, sometimes miraculously, to raise all the money necessary, i still fear that this will be the time it won't happen. and the truly crazy part is, that if someone were to share the same fear with me, i would be the first person to tell them that God always provides, that i've never seen someone, no matter how dire the situation, not get all their funding for a missions trip in all the years i've been doing them...and i would mean it for them, yet for me, i question, making the whole mission idea not a particularly safe one.

gary haugen's words from last year's leadership summit have been once again haunting me.

Jesus didn't come to make us safe, he came to make us brave.

if i am really honest, i don't want to live a life marked by safety. anyone can do that. anyone can only attempt what they can do in the physical. anyone can do something when the outcome is completely predictable. as appealing as 'safe' can be at times, for the most part, the idea is more revolting to me.

brave is definitely the more challenging of the options...

enough is enough

i have unofficially given 2009 the title, the year of conquering irrational fears.

recently i've come to the conclusion that the longer that i allow myself to be held captive by things that i either fear justfiably, or fear because of the unknown elements, the stronger their hold becomes over me.

case in point: the dentist. until thursday, it has been a lifetime since i've been to the dentist. after the very brutal root canal {post the traumatic youth group tobogganning accident}, then a very ugly wisdom teeth extraction experience, i figured i had had all i could take with those in the dental field. i could take care of my teeth. i brush. floss. do all the things the people do to take care of their teeth...except regular dental visits.

then, at some point over the past few weeks, i started thinking how irrational it was that i am not afraid to travel alone in europe, but to sit for an hour in a dentist's chair renders me spitless. but seriously, how much harder could a visit to the dentist be than having to wait alone in the entrance of the kiev/borispol airport by myself for seven hours after only two hours of sleep?

so, i booked an appointment, and went. {BTW, no cavities!} and realized that all the evil, scary, lurking things were bigger in my mind than they were in reality.

our minds do that. they make the scary things scarier, and the longer we go without confronting these things, the stronger their power over us becomes.

hence the year of conquering irrational fears.

what are you afraid of?

just enough...

last night at small group, inspired by a francis chan video, my small group and i talked about committing this whole month to praying at least once a day the prayer the found in proverbs 30:7-9.

Two things I ask of you, Lord; do not refuse me before I die: Keep falsehood and lies far from me; give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread. Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you and say, ‘Who is the Lord?’Or I may become poor and steal, and so dishonor the name of my God.

give me only my daily bread. this prayer touches so many things...so many things that if i'm honest i'm not entirely excited to face. contentment issues. trust issues. dependence/independence issues. but at its heart, lies the question that we keep coming back to every week during 'the story' series at PORTICO, can God be trusted? and a question that each of us must wrestle with until we can live in peace with the answer.

so, our plan is to individually pray this prayer every day this month, and for those not brave enough to want to pray it today, their prayer will be to ask God for the strength and courage to pray such a bold, life-altering prayer.

in all of this, the words of gary haugen (ijm) from the leadership summit 2008 keep playing and replaying in the back of my mind:

Jesus didn't come to make us safe. he came to make us brave.

this is my prayer this morning...make us brave, Lord.