Jonathots Daily Blog
(2070)
I said yes to life, so here comes no–to give me a chance to prove my point.
I shove off to achieve and circumstances push back. Now what?
Leaning–either to my own understanding, or trusting God. One makes sense to me and the other sounds really religious. But here’s the problem with my understanding: it is generations and generations and situations and situations, literally screaming at me, “Be careful!”
Now deep in my soul I know that I’ve never been successful while pursuing a path of caution. I haven’t even managed to manipulate a comfortable status quo. After all, the world is filled with tribulation and if you’re not prepared to adjust to the new dilemmas, you will lose ground even if you don’t move one way or the other.
- My understanding tells me to find a safe path.
- My understanding reminds me to protect myself.
- My understanding has a tendency to negate the feelings of others.
- My understanding generates suspicion which limits my possibilities by removing folks who could be my benefactors.
Trusting God is the step of allowing myself to “be ready.” Ready for what?
- Ready for change.
- Ready for adjustment,
- Ready to use my talents.
- Ready to recognize opportunity.
- Ready to completely alter my circumstances if such a maneuver grants me my heart’s desire.
Yes, it comes down to a choice between “be careful” and “be ready.”
Case in point is what happened to me this weekend in Vandalia. I was a little bit frustrated with the circumstances of an engagement that came our way. It was a late-notice arrangement and I was never fully convinced that the venue wanted us to come in the first place. I’m a human being. I want to be loved, I want to be appreciated and I want to be needed. I felt the church had decided to “accommodate” me. I hate that word. I don’t want to be accommodated–I want to be desired.
So because of that, when a storm watch foretold of bad weather on Sunday night, I seized on the opportunity to cancel the date, fully aware that if there were a tornado watch in the air, all of God’s little children would scurry to their basements.
You see, it sounds logical. But actually I was being careful.
Careful about the storm, careful about the audience, and mostly–careful to avoid humiliation by small attendance.
As it turns out, the alleged vicious outpouring from the heavens never materialized and the concert could have been held without interruption.
My leaning was to my own understanding. Rather than being ready to use my talents, abilities and take a chance that things would work out to the good, I decided to be careful. I did it because I was frustrated, cautious and quite honestly, a little lazy.
So the good folks of Vandalia never got a chance to receive what we could share with them.
- I was tentative
- I was traditional.
- I was fussy.
- I decided to be careful.
And by the way…I was wrong.
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Jonathots Daily Blog 