What's Stopping You?

What do you really want to do in your life? Think about your relationships, your vocation, your hobbies and interests, your faith life - whatever? What's a burning desire of your heart? Then ask yourself, "What's preventing me from doing that?"

As a pre-teen and teen, I wanted to be a sprinter in track and field. I really wasn't very good as a sprinter. Coaches told me I should be a distance runner. I tried that, and the first run over a mile nearly killed me, I thought. I envied those who could run long distances without stopping, but I decided that would never happen for me. In my late thirties I took up power walking as a form of exercise. I was fairly good at that. I won a couple of walk races, and even placed second in my age group at a state level walk race. (It was a distant and fairly slow second at that level!) Then someone said to me, "As fast as you walk, you should just go ahead and break into a run." Again, I never saw myself as a distance runner, and couldn't imagine it.

Then for reasons I don't remember, I tried it. The first time I ran five minutes in one direction, then five minutes back. I lived to tell about it. Before long I was running ten minutes in one direction, then ten back. Long story short, I am now a hopelessly addicted distance runner. I'm pretty slow, but I love doing it. I've even entered a few 5K races, and won my age group in the last race in which I ran. (Granted, there may have been a grand total of three in my age group!)

What kept me from running all these years? I did! I know many of us are blocked from the things we'd like to do or feel called to do because of external circumstances. Still, I believe we're often hindered by ourselves, our own presumed limitations, our view of ourselves, and our view of the world around us. In the case of those who share my faith, we often limit ourselves by failing to believe that all things are possible for our God, and where we are weak, God is strong?

So what's the desire and/or calling of your heart? What's keeping you from it?

Safety or Life?

Many people have weighed in with their reactions to 16 year old Abby Sunderland's attempt to sail solo around the world. (She had to abandon her quest after three days adrift and disconnected after a storm in the Indian Ocean.) Apparently most of the reaction is negative against Abby's parents. How could they let a 16 year old do such a thing? That's way too young! Her parents should have been more responsible; a 16 year old doesn't have the maturity and capability to take on something so daunting. It amounts to child endangerment! (I could say something here about parents who dress their elementary aged daughters up like high class hookers and throw them in "Miss Whatever" pageants and suggest that this is also child endangerment, but I won't go there right now.)

I'm all for safety and parental responsibility. I don't think I could have let my 16 year old child sail around the world. Yet I'm getting just old enough that I wonder if we aren't sometimes a little too over-sanitized and over-protected. When I was a kid (that phrase was a sure sign of an old codger) we'd bound out after a summer's breakfast, hop on our bikes, and head out who knows where for the day. We were sure to come back home for supper with skinned knees and a few bruises, but those are the days we now sit around and talk about with other old duffers. Today, the kid doesn't get on his or her bike without a thorough going over with sunscreen, a pocket container of hand sanitizer, a helmet, a cell phone, a GPS guide to acceptable routes, and a police escort.

Okay, okay...I exaggerate. Yes, I know - we live in a different world now. Believe me, I am grateful for all the safety developments that have blessed and benefited my children and grandchildren. Here's the thing, though...is the real, ultimate object of life to be safe, or to live? Life itself has risk. Risk is as integral to life as breathing, eating, working, playing, and loving. In some ways, risks and all, I think Abby Sunderland has decided to live. She wants to tackle an around the world attempt again. At some level, I admire her.

My faith system and community rallies around someone named Jesus. He took lots of risks. In fact, he took the ultimate risk - willingly facing death with the faith that something was on the other side. Those who followed him initially did so at great risk to themselves. Yet somehow living for and with him far outweighed the risks, or at least re-prioritized them. Reportedly Jesus said, "I have come that they may have life and have it in abundance." I haven't found any place where he said, "I have come to keep them safe from any risks."

So, do you think life is about staying safe or about living it fully? Or have I oversimplified this? Do you think Abby should sail again? I'll see you around the next bend in the river.

Back to the River

I spent last Thursday kayaking on a southwest Missouri Ozark creek. As always, it brought me back to where I started this blog journey two or three years ago.

A river is what life is. Canoeing or kayaking a rapid stream experiences life as it really is. Life is moving. There's no such thing as status quo, maintaining, or keeping everything just as it is. A river can run slow and feel like a small lake. Then the river can shoot you through rapids. The mainstream can take you right into a brush pile. You may or may not know what's around the next bend. A familiar shoot and known barriers one year can look totally different the next year. The skills that got your canoe or kayak through the last set of rapids may be useless on the next set. No one plan of action works for a whole trip. Your plan has to change and adapt every stoke of the paddle. The water may be high or it may be low. The only certain thing is the river's steady, relentless flow to join the next river, to join the next river, to join the Mississippi, to join the sea.

If you like the predictability of a lake or a canal or something, more power to you. If you want a life that's under control, I really wish more power to you. Personally, I think you're living in an illusion. Life flows; the sooner we accept that, the better. For me, a very real and very involved God is the author of the flow and the guide. And the guide is known as the one called Jesus of Nazareth.

I'm probably making too much of a four hour float trip. Whatever...I just feel more energized to keep paddling. Hope you'll join me. I'll see you around the next bend in the river.

Caring to Learn the Language

I'm still thinking about all the hoopla about shutting down our borders, illegal aliens, etc. (See a few posts back.) Many raise legitimate economic concerns around having so many people within the borders of the United States who are not legal residents. Some say that legal immigration itself should be slowed, especially from Central American countries. There are those who make a big issue over language, as it relates to Hispanic people in our country, saying, "If they are going to live here and benefit from being here, they need to learn our language!" (So, did we Caucasians learn the native American languages we found when we landed here five centuries ago, or did we make them learn ours? Sorry....couldn't resist! Different blog entry for a different time...)

Anyway, here's the deal about language. We a granddaughter who is about a year and a half old. She is starting to use words, which is very exciting to parents and grandparents. However, as much as we make a big deal about toddlers learning to speak as we do, we in fact learn their language along the way as well. With our granddaughter, I know what her sounds and gestures mean. I know how she signals "yes" and "no," I know how she communicates, "I'm excited!" and I know how she says, "I'm scared," or "I'm uneasy." She knows how to tell me she wants to do something, without using words that are in my vocabulary. I take the time and trouble to know her language because I care about her and her well being is a very high priority.

If we care about someone and/or if we have something important to communicate to someone, we will find out how to do that in a way that makes sense in that person's language. If we don't do that, we send a message that we don't care, like it or not. In the world of organized Christian religion, our greatest desire is that persons meet, know, and experience the life-changing presence of the one known as Jesus of Nazareth. However, we are too often guilty of not learning the "language" of those whom we want to introduce to Jesus. We expect them to learn our language to find out about Jesus. And we church people do have a language. How many of you have a clue as the meaning of the following words: narthex, chancel, nave, baptistry, vestibule, hymnody, offertory? (Frankly, I don't know the meaning of half of them, and I've been in church most of my life!) This is a language the world around us does not know, but we expect them to pick it up on their own. Intended or not, basically that sends a message that says, "We don't want you!"

So, back to the southern border of the USA...Is that what we want to say - "We don't want you!" Did we punt that, "Give me your tired, your poor," things somewhere along the way and I missed that memo? Still just thinking out loud. I'll see you around the next bend in the river.