“All around you, people will be tiptoeing through life, just to arrive at death safely. But dear children, do not tiptoe. Run, hop, skip, or dance; just don’t tiptoe.”
I’ve been reading The Irresistible Revolution by Shane Claiborne. The catch phrase for the book is, “it will comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable.” It doesn’t take a genius to realize that I, among most Christians, am a part of the latter of the two choices, I am among the comfortable. Or I suppose I should say I WAS among the comfortable. During my time reading this book, God has literally turned my world upside down. I’ve given up things in the name of the Lord that I never thought I would give up. I’ve confessed things to my brothers and sisters in Christ that I never EVER thought I would share. God is literally showing me exactly who I am and exactly who I’m supposed to be. My materialism has been shaken to the core. My apathy has been starved and my heart is overflowing with compassion and understanding that I’ve never known before. And it’s so incredible because it’s obviously not because of anything that I’ve done. The things of this world have built a brick wall around my heart that I’ve never cared to tear down. But while reading this book, talking to a few people who are so closely following the Lord, and spending time with my Father in Heaven, He is slowly breaking down this wall. Slowly but surely I feel Him taking it down, brick by brick. It’s such a freeing feeling.
The quote above might be the quote that hit me the most. It pretty much speaks for itself. We spend so much time worrying about our comfort and our safety, and in the meantime God’s kingdom is not growing. In our comfort, in our apathy, in our materialism, our worldly desires are met but the immeasurable hole of your God-given need to be living for the Glory of Christ will NEVER be fulfilled by your big screen tv, macbook, and endless playlists. (Trust me, I tried it.) And in our comfort and our apathy and our materialism, GOD’S KINGDOM IS STILL NOT GROWING. We need to be radically living for Christ. He SAVED you. Don’t you get it, child of God? You’ve been bought, you’ve been adopted, you are loved, you are forgiven, and it was all done through the most brutal death in history. Yet we are comfortable? How does that happen? How can we possibly be comfortable with the fact that we are sinners, we are wrong, we are wretched, we deserved the Cross, yet an innocent man took it for us? I hope Jesus shakes you up. I pray He turns your world upside down. I pray He so beautifully disturbs your comfortable life as He so magnificently disturbed mine.
I think this is my “New Year’s Resolution”.. except I’d like to consider it more a “New Life Resolution.” I will not be comfortable. The fact that half the world is dying from preventable causes will no longer not affect me. I will not arrive safely at death. I’m gonna run. I’m gonna hop. I’m gonna skip. And for the love of my Lord, I’m gonna dance. All the way to the gates of Heaven. I’m gonna dance until it kills me, and then I’ll dance some more. So hey, world. I’m done with your comfort. I’m done with your apathy. I’m done with your materials. I’ve got a Love that saves. And a Drink that satisfies. I’ve got God that will provide for me, and a Savior that died to protect me. His blood flows through me, as well as His compassion and His love for all people. You’ve lost your grip on me, world. You lose.
