What Did He Just Say?

This past weekend I said something that was alarming. Even to me.

The introduction of my speech included the use of an "F" word from a childhood memory. Certainly there were gasps. People stunned with bewildered looks on stoic faces. While others sheepishly grinned. But not for reasons you would think.

In an effort to garner the attention of my audience I had stooped to a level of unprecedented depths. I said the word "fart" in church. And as a 10 year old boy in the home of my best friend I had carelessly used this "obscene gesture" to describe the unpleasant disdain of my friend's ill-timed shenanigans.

But this was not the alarming statement of my speech.

My sermon had focused on some obscene "F" words that prevent us from accomplishing and fulfilling our God-given calling in life. Words and phrases like "I'm fine" and fear and failure.

I expressed these sentiments as casual thoughts and attitudes that rob us from experiencing life to the full. To say "I'm fine" keeps casual conversations at bay from peering into the depths of our soul. It will not allow for honesty and vulnerability to shape our attitudes and actions. Fear frustrates and paralyzes us from accomplishing even greater endeavors than our resume already includes. Failure convinces us that we are the sum of our past mistakes instead of believing in second chances.

And then I shared what I believe can be life-altering thoughts to depose these gestures that keep us bound captive from experiencing God's best for our lives.

Forgiveness, faith, and freedom.

When we recognize that we've been forgiven we can choose to embrace and extend that forgiveness to create a dynamic shift in the way we see ourselves and others around us. When our faith is renewed it allows trust to take root, not in our strengths and abilities, but in the eternal presence and power of God to prevail. And the freedom we now have in Christ begins to release the chains and bondage of sin in our lives. To see ourselves as sons and daughters of God for that's who we are.

And here was the alarming illustration that is a constant battle and a constant frustration even in my own life.

Remember, the children of Israel? God sent Moses to be their deliverer from Egypt. They crossed the Red Sea and the Egyptian army was drowned. And God's people were free.

But do you remember their response to Moses in the desert? "You brought us out here to die! It would have been better for us to stay in Egypt!"

Are you serious? It would have been better to be in bondage and captivity and under the harsh rule of Pharaoh than to be free among God's people?

Lest we be too harsh we must remember that our hearts are just as sin-stricken as theirs. We oftentimes prefer the known to the unknown. The familiar rather than the unfamiliar. Even though Egpyt is more costly than the wilderness we still prefer bondage over freedom. Why? This battle that's raging in our minds blankets these "F" words: fine, fear, failure, forgiveness, faith, and freedom and we're constantly having to choose between Egypt and the wilderness.

Conforming to the patterns of this world will keep us confined to Egypt's landscape of captivity but being transformed by the renewing of our minds will lead us precisely toward God's will for our lives be it the wilderness or beyond.

Here's my dilemma: Egpyt or the wilderness? Conform or be transformed?  Fine or forgiven? Fear or faith? Failure or free? Slave or son? Whatever course God is establishing for my life, that's the path I want to take. The journey that places all my trust and confidence in Him. Because He's good.