When my boys learned to walk, it was both exciting and nerve wracking.  They were beginning to learn a new skill – one that was necessary and would lead to so many other incredible discoveries.  But as they learned, they fell.  They stumbled.  Lost balance.  Got lots of bumps and bruises.  However, not one of them stopped their quest to master walking because of their setbacks.  They just got back up and kept trying.  No matter how much they struggled, they just kept moving forward.

I think I have a lot to learn by reflecting on this process of watching my babies learn to walk.  I am trying to learn something new these days.  I am trying to overcome my fears of stumbling and failing and just keep moving forward one small step at a time.

A few years ago, I felt God calling me to speak and write.  I heard God telling me to start a blog. The idea has been both exciting and nerve wracking.  Mostly the latter.  I know nothing about blogs or how to set one up.  I’ve done so little writing in recent years, I’m not sure I can put decent sentences together anymore, let alone anything compelling enough for anyone to choose to read.  I’ve felt paralyzed by fear.

For the past several months, I’ve tried taking teeny tiny baby steps forward.  God’s tug has remained constant.  Did you catch it’s been a few YEARS since I’ve heard that call??  I’ve been realizing that a “not-yet” mindset or reluctant obedience is DISobedience and that’s the last way I want to respond to Jesus.  So even though I’m not moving very fast, I’m moving.  Stumbling really.  But moving nonetheless.

As a child learns to walk, they don’t start taking steps instantaneously.  It’s a slow and natural progression.  They learn to sit, then to crawl, to pull themselves up to stand, and to cruise around the furniture.  After all these stages of their development they can begin to take independent walking steps.  I’m not supposed to have all of this blog/writing/speaking stuff figured out BEFORE I start.  I just keep doing the next thing and the next.  Even though it feels like it takes me a painfully long time to figure out how to change something on my blog, I just keep trying.  I’m sure I will get it eventually, and little by little it will all become easier and less foreign.

I also know part of my fear is what’s to come.  WHY has God asked this of me?  What is ahead?  I get nervous because I feel if God has asked me to start a blog and move in the direction of speaking and writing then it’s all supposed to BE something. But when babies start walking they actually have no idea about running, jumping, skipping, hopping, bike riding or all the many wonderful physical skills that will follow in the years after they master learning to walk.  They don’t start walking SO THAT they can hop on a bike.  I can’t let all the questions of what’s coming in the future hinder me from the next right thing.  It’s not my job to know where my journey will take me, only to obey with what I know now and with what’s in front of me.

Results and reasons are God’s department.  I have joked to a few people that literally a handful of people are likely to read my blog.  (Hi Mom!)  And that’s ok.  Maybe my mom will always be the only person to read it (and my husband if I remind him 😉 ).   What matters is that I’m obedient to what the Lord has prompted in my heart.  I don’t have to know why God wants me to, or what he may or may not do in my life (or my blog) down the road.  It’s very possible that the whole point is that I learn to be obedient in the face of fear.  Perhaps God just wants me to step out in faith and learn to trust Him in a new and deeper way.  Just maybe God is training me to take small baby steps way out of my comfort zone simply because he has asked.

The “heroes of faith” in the Bible rarely knew where they were headed.  Many of them were given strange promises (like Sarah bearing a child in old age), daunting tasks (like Moses commanding Pharaoh to release the Israelites), difficult commands (like Abraham sacrificing his son), or directives that were out of their current skill set (like Noah building an ark).  It did not stop them from obedience.  They had faith.

 

“Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. ² This is what the ancients were commended for.”  Hebrews 11:1-2

 

I’m feeling a little like all these people in Hebrews 11 in various aspects.  My assignment doesn’t make sense, it’s daunting, it’s difficult, and it’s out of my skill set.  At this stage in my journey I can most relate to Abraham.  Look at this verse further in the Hebrews passage:

 

“By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going.”  Hebrews 11:8

Can you imagine?  He just went.  Because he was being obedient.  Even though there was no knowing where his journey would end and he didn’t know where to go.  He just followed God, and perhaps at times it was even a step by step journey of asking God which way to walk next.

I want to be a woman whose life is ruled by faith.  Not fear.  It’s easy to succumb to the excuses and the tremblings and the what ifs.  But my God is bigger than all those things.  And at the end of the day, I am held accountable to whether or not I was obedient to what God asked me to do.  He didn’t ask me to figure out everything along the way, know where the journey will take me, or to be qualified in some way.  Those things are his job, and when I try to tackle them myself, I am taking responsibility that is God’s alone.

My boys are all excellent walkers these days.  In fact, now they all run.  A lot!  But that was not always the case.  They had to start somewhere.  There were tears and wobblings and determinations and sometimes bumps on the head.

I’ve got tears and a wobbly stomach and determined heart and there will surely be bumps along the way.  But I have to start somewhere.

 

Faith over Fear.  One baby step at a time.

 

What about you?  Is there something God has asked you to do?  It could be big or small, but perhaps for a variety of reasons you’ve been reluctant to obey.  My prayer today is that you’ll join me in choosing obedience.  Choosing to have faith in a God that is bigger than your fears.  Just start with a step.  And I’d love to hear how God is showing His faithfulness to you as you are faithful to Him.  Thanks for taking the journey with me!