I love reading devotionals and using them to dig deeper into
the Word of God. I think they are a wonderful tool for starting my day and for
my husband and I to connect with each other at the start of each new day but it
occurred to me that what am doing is only part of my responsibility as a
believer. I need to stop this….WE need to stop this.
Last night I was a
coward. I am writing this blog because I have been convicted of not listening
to the Spirit. As we drove up to the diamond to set up for my husband’s
baseball team there was a truck parked near the diamond which I thought was a
player who arrived early but noticed there was no one inside and no one around.
As we got out of the truck to begin to prep for the game I saw a young man
sitting at the far side of the field in the stands. He was not wearing a
uniform so was not there to play baseball and as I got closer to him I noticed
he would be too young to play on this over 35 league anyway. I went about
unlocking the washrooms, getting equipment out and turning on the lights and
felt strongly that there was something burdening this young man. I began to
pray in my heart to Jesus for him. I set up my chair for the game and got out
my crossword to do as I waited for the team to arrive, all the while praying
over and over again in my heart for this young man’s heart that I sensed was
broken. As other team members arrived I prayed that my husband would see him
too and go over and pray for him. Another member of the team walked towards the
young man who was getting down off the stands and the young man stopped and
said “hello” to him and kept going. He began to walk towards me and my spirit
began to urge me to say something, to pray for him and all I could say to him
was “Is everything Okay?” He stopped and looked at me and said “No…..I mean everything’s
is fine” with a look of despair on his face. I wanted to pray for him, the Holy
Spirit was urging me to and I just watched him walk away. The fear I had of the
embarrassment I might feel if he responded negatively to me was quickly
replaced by the fear that this young man was so desperate that he might hurt himself
or someone else or even worse continue to live in this world with no hope. He
got in his truck and drove away.
I take in all of this
Truth from the Word of God but kept it secret at a time when it was most
needed. I allowed fear to stop me in my tracks. The great irony of this is that
the day before I broke through my fear of heights by climbing up a mountain,
then a 50 foot stair case to what was called the Thunderbirds nest and zip
lined across Canada’s largest twin zip line with my husband over top of the
trees!!!! I did not allow fear to control me the day before but the thought of
asking a stranger if I could pray for them paralyzed me. How did I allow fear
to keep me from sharing the Truth of God’s love with someone? Am I simply a
coward or worse a hypocrite or perhaps both? Why did I choose to say nothing,
to ignore the nudging of the Holy Spirit? Why did I see that moment as
something different than the moments I am in the city and see a homeless person
on the street and easily let them know that God loves them? Like somehow
someone who is homeless is less likely to know that Truth then someone whose
desperation is simply found in their eyes and not the condition of their clothing
or pocket book.
We need to stop absorbing the Word feeling the effects of
the Truth on our lives and holding it hostage only releasing it to the next person we deem worthy
to hear it, most likely someone else who is walking a faith journey with us or
at least has started to already ask questions or who we deem desperate enough
to need it. How offensive must that be to the One who commanded us to do the
opposite? ` How he must grieve when the richness of His Word spills into us
giving us living water but we only release it when we feel comfortable that
that person will receive it well, when the chances of us being rejected is slim
at best or to never share it at all.
We look at the big world and dream of travelling to spread
the word of God, we campaign and raise funds to “enrich the lives of others
with the Truth of Gods Word “ and travel many miles to release this Truth to
strangers in a strange land yet 20 feet to the right or left of us is our
neighbors driveway, right beside us in the grocery store is a family in need of
that same Truth and just a whisper away is our spouses who we give our physical
selves to but keep the only thing that will sustain us both locked away out of
fear and rejection.
What is it about us that keeps us so selfish? Why do we keep
the only thing in our lives of any value locked away until the perfect
moment? It is not something that will
lose its value if we release it, it only increases in life and power the more
you give it away. So what is the lie we are believing? What story do we tell
ourselves in order to justify keeping the only thing that gives life eternal to
people?
If the price is too big to tell them the good news, the
price of conflict, rejection or ridicule then we must simply stop this whole
charade right now. There are plenty of non-believers doing great things for
many people all over the earth so why not let go of this thing we seem so
ashamed of at times yet use as a badge of honor at other times and join them?
The Word says we will be mocked. We want the perks of
knowing Christ as our Lord and Saviour but we are not interested in anyone else
having it. We choose to not love people every day of our lives and wait for
them to die before we justify in our heads that someone somewhere told them the
Truth, we are such cowards! We believe the lie that having those conversations
will cause more harm than good yet we claim to believe in Christ for our own
fire insurance to protect us from the very hell we are watching people walk
right into!
No one wants to be seen as that crazy person who talks about
Jesus all the time like that guy who ate locusts who ended up losing his head
yet we hold him up in great regard from our pews on Sunday morning. We are hypocrites
in the worst way. We teach our children about the great people of scripture but
then model the very opposite to them. We tell them to share their faith with
others on the playground by loving them because that what Jesus does and yet we
refuse to do it at work, from our front porches or in our marriages!
Have you ever seen a stranger who looks so lost and sad and
asked if you could pray for them or simply told them that God loves them? I’m
not just talking about the homeless person who is so desperate for contact with
people that prayer would be something they may say yes to easily but you can choose whether you bump into them
again or not, I’m talking about the one in line at the grocery store who is at
the end of their rope with their kids, the neighbor who never seems happy about
anything or your spouse who seems to be distant from you lately. These will not
be easy and may not even be pretty at times but God never said they would be. These conversations do not need to happen on
a church sponsored mission’s trip, there is no need for special shots, no
equipment you need to buy and the only prep you need is your own prayer time
with God. You do see what the problem is don’t you? It’s far too simple isn’t it?
There is no build up, lists to complete, items to buy or training to follow, that’s
the problem….the problem is you can go and do this NOW right now no matter where
you are, that’s the problem we have developed systems, training, classes,
lists, rules and regulations for doing the very thing we were commanded to do
by Jesus. His command seems very simple to me and yet I too struggle with
putting it into practice at times.
God changes hearts through the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit
that we claim to have within us. There are people all over the world who need
to hear the truth of the Gospel for sure but there are people we see every day
who are desperate for that same Truth. I
DARE us today to tell one person about how much they are loved by Jesus, I
DOUBLE DARE us to share how that experience went, good bad or ugly, I DARE us because
the more we justify our safety and security and peace at the risk of eternity
for others the more we live inside the truth of who some unbelievers say we
are, a group of people out for our own interests to help build bigger country
clubs equipped with hospitality teams, concert crews and zombie followers
mindlessly joining groups where more of us are in a strange self-contained
world we call the body of believers.
We need to Stop reading devotionals and keeping that revelation
and truth to ourselves…………DO as we were commanded, love people well and tell
them the Truth.
