The Emotion of The Journey
Published by Korey Buchanek under on 2:48 PM
October 14, 2010
The emotion on the front end of taking a risk to follow Christ is much different than the emotion you experience on the back end. Many will never understand what I’m talking about. For those that have given up a dream or ambition to follow Christ in His purpose for their life understand the emotion that I’m speaking of. This emotion rests in a place where there are a thousand questions about our futures. It’s a place that is foreign and uncomfortable because it’s produced in our lives when we give up our ways in exchange for His. It is not comfortable. It is not always joyous and it is defiantly not easy.
The questions of "why" are met with silence. The ability to see beyond tomorrow is void. Everything is new and strange. You’re met with an overwhelming tension between what you've known and loved with the reality of a calling to love and invest yourself into something different. I don’t think it’s anything new. It’s a tension that goes all the way back to the first church. I see it in the pages of Jews being sent to influence Gentiles and Gentiles going to the Jews. Its image is overlooked in the fine details on page after page of people reaching into the lives of people that were unlike their own. To stay in Jerusalem would have been easy, but Samaria?
It’s an amazing thing when you find yourself being thrust into the deeper realms of scripture. See Acts1:8 has taken on a whole new tone and significance to me. I just thought I understood the “uttermost parts of the world” bit because of a mission trip here and there. I thought I had a glimpse of a diverse culture that the “Samaria” reference stood for in our church speak. I couldn’t have been more wrong.
Diversity is not truly understood when you are in the majority. Diversity is only understood when you are faced with a reality that you are the minority and the knowledge that you will continue to be. That is not necessarily a bad thing. However, it does give you a deeper glimpse into the cost of reaching your “Samaria” or the “utter most parts”. I’m finding that this knowledge is another tool that my Redeemer is using to bring me into a deeper reliance of who He is. This kind of education strips us down of the self-reliance and pride that our Jerusalem’s tend build up within us. There is nothing more sobering than being in place that sees no value in your accomplishments somewhere else.
This place of reliance on who He is can be a good place. It can be a place of intimacy with the King. It can strengthen us. It can prepare us for a journey that can blow our minds and speak to our souls. It can change us. However, it has to start within the heart and emotion of who we are. See the emotion that we tend to make the choice to step out and follow our King with so frequently changes when our pursuit takes us through Samaria. Our emotion begins to change when our expectations are altered. Our emotions begin to speak with more reality in our lives than our God. It’s a dangerous place to be, hence the need to address our dependence on our Father. My emotions are God given, but so is His Word. What I choose to listen to more will greatly alter how I see my God. He continues to speak into me… “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not in your own understanding, but in all of your ways acknowledge Him and He will direct your path.”
The emotion on the front end of taking a risk to follow Christ is much different than the emotion you experience on the back end. Many will never understand what I’m talking about. For those that have given up a dream or ambition to follow Christ in His purpose for their life understand the emotion that I’m speaking of. This emotion rests in a place where there are a thousand questions about our futures. It’s a place that is foreign and uncomfortable because it’s produced in our lives when we give up our ways in exchange for His. It is not comfortable. It is not always joyous and it is defiantly not easy.
The questions of "why" are met with silence. The ability to see beyond tomorrow is void. Everything is new and strange. You’re met with an overwhelming tension between what you've known and loved with the reality of a calling to love and invest yourself into something different. I don’t think it’s anything new. It’s a tension that goes all the way back to the first church. I see it in the pages of Jews being sent to influence Gentiles and Gentiles going to the Jews. Its image is overlooked in the fine details on page after page of people reaching into the lives of people that were unlike their own. To stay in Jerusalem would have been easy, but Samaria?
It’s an amazing thing when you find yourself being thrust into the deeper realms of scripture. See Acts1:8 has taken on a whole new tone and significance to me. I just thought I understood the “uttermost parts of the world” bit because of a mission trip here and there. I thought I had a glimpse of a diverse culture that the “Samaria” reference stood for in our church speak. I couldn’t have been more wrong.
Diversity is not truly understood when you are in the majority. Diversity is only understood when you are faced with a reality that you are the minority and the knowledge that you will continue to be. That is not necessarily a bad thing. However, it does give you a deeper glimpse into the cost of reaching your “Samaria” or the “utter most parts”. I’m finding that this knowledge is another tool that my Redeemer is using to bring me into a deeper reliance of who He is. This kind of education strips us down of the self-reliance and pride that our Jerusalem’s tend build up within us. There is nothing more sobering than being in place that sees no value in your accomplishments somewhere else.
This place of reliance on who He is can be a good place. It can be a place of intimacy with the King. It can strengthen us. It can prepare us for a journey that can blow our minds and speak to our souls. It can change us. However, it has to start within the heart and emotion of who we are. See the emotion that we tend to make the choice to step out and follow our King with so frequently changes when our pursuit takes us through Samaria. Our emotion begins to change when our expectations are altered. Our emotions begin to speak with more reality in our lives than our God. It’s a dangerous place to be, hence the need to address our dependence on our Father. My emotions are God given, but so is His Word. What I choose to listen to more will greatly alter how I see my God. He continues to speak into me… “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not in your own understanding, but in all of your ways acknowledge Him and He will direct your path.”
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