Adventure

When was the last time that you recall a heart-pounding stomach in your throat experience???

Was it when you jumped out of a plane? Tackled a higher, more advanced ski hill? Stepped out in faith to touch someone’s heart? Or stepped beyond your shyness and answered a question in small group, in front of people you don’t know?

I am more and more convinced that God wired us for adventure. Male and female, it doesn’t seem to matter. It is embracing that danger that gets our hearts pumping and requires more from ourselves than we ever thought possible. It puts us in a position to trust God.

Part of the sense of adventure is the thrill of over-riding that instinct which would protect your life or your dignity. This survival instinct is so strong, and for good reason it was designed by an amazing God, to keep us from throwing our lives away. As is the case though, what God intends for our good, the enemy can twist to keep us from the fullest life God intended. Our survival instinct can be warped to keep us in bondage to our past.

I recall a time in grade 8, I entered a talent show, not a contest with judging or anything, just a chance to celebrate each other. I chose to sing. While I have delusions of grandeur … I am no Celine, I know that I can carry a tune. Somehow though, the tape I was singing to was poor quality and I couldn’t hear it. I as I sang, I saw the looks of horror on my classmates’ faces, eventually silent horror turned into outright booing. I fled the stage in tears and hid for the rest of the day in a dark room. To this day, if you put a microphone in my hand and ask me to sing, I freeze, there is a survival instinct that kicks in to protect me from further pain in this area. Is this rational?? Is this a good use of a defense mechanism? The enemy has warped it in a vain attempt to protect my pride. So many people have legitimate fears and hurts from their past that keep them from making similar mistakes that could be to their detriment- that is not what I am referring to….

I refer instead to those things that keep up bound to irrational fears and concerns.

If we are to overcome these irrational fears and bondages, we must cling to the Cross of Christ. Then we must act… if your biggest fear is to speak to strangers yet some where at the depths of your soul you yearn to preach… that is holding you hostage.

God has this funny way of using us in our weakness so that we HAVE to rely on Him. Think of Moses the stutterer…. Called to go before Pharoah to SPEAK the words of God.

2 summers ago, I had the amazing experience to go skydiving. It was a spur of the moment decision, and one of the BEST experiences ever!! I was excited and nervous until they announced that I would be going next, then I was ‘in the zone’. I got very serious and very focused, I watched as they packed my chute and I watched as my instructor put on his gear. I knew that as important as MY harness was, it was his harness that held our chute.

I remember experiencing an extraordinary quietness in my spirit as we took off. I was more concerned about losing my lunch in the back of the tiny plane than about jumping out of it. As we approached the jump zone, the only thought I had was “this is a perfectly functioning plane, why am I jumping out of it??” I was not afraid, I was not scared of the height, I wasn’t imagining all the things that could go wrong, all I had to do was to override this idea that although we were not in any danger on board the plane, we were exiting it.

Sky diving was a defining moment in my life. I took a risk that I always wanted to but never thought I would follow through on. There have been so many lost opportunities ranging from not dancing with a great guy, to not pursuing a dream to go on a cultural exchange in school. For some reason I allowed a sense on inferiority to hold me back from these life experiences.

Now though, I have gotten a taste of living a ‘dangerous’ life for God. Stepping out in prophetic giftings, risking being wrong to make sure that God’s loving messages are delivered when they are needed.

I long for adventure, and my soul burns to do something significant for God. I recently read “In a Pit with a Lion on a Snowy Day”. It is a book all about taking advantage of opportunities that arise before us and being prepared to respond. It is too easy to blame my mortgage, or my past, or my insecurities for holding my in a job that is sucking life from my very soul. I see too many people around me who have succumbed to the ‘safety’ of middle age, stable job, stable spouse, stable hobbies, safe safe safe….

I would rather put my physical life in danger doing what God has called me to, than to die a slow miserable death of my hopes and dreams.
I am not advocating being stupid and risking life and limb in the pursuit of adrenaline (as I have been accused of!), nor do I think that you should leave a great marriage just because it is safe. Rather, in little ways each day, find something that makes your heart pump and your eyes sparkle and makes you rely on God just a little more. Take a risk. Find that adventure.