As children one of the games we learned to play may have been “Follow the Leader.” There was even a song that some sang about following the leader and it was one of those rare games where you didn’t need to have a special skill to take your turn being the one leading. (I was one of those.) One of the other bonuses was that it didn’t result in as much comparing ourselves with one another as so many others did. You could be silly, klutzy, overly serious, or the best athlete and everyone could just enjoy trying to follow whoever was leading.

Then it wasn’t long before categorizing started. There tended to be two groups – leaders and followers – and it seemed that leaders were the ones who were lauded the most for all the characteristics that resulted in the label. Many times, someone who was simply a “follower” could be seen as “less than” by some.

Those labels often shadowed us all through school and well into adulthood. Some would call a person “a natural born leader” and other times other descriptions would be used. I wonder which you identify with. As for me, I was seldom considered to be a leader so far as I know and usually preferred to follow someone else I thought knew more than I did. That may or may not have been true, the person may have not known more, but somehow the label influenced me and many others.

I think God might look at that differently. A quick scan of people whom God has used or is using includes many who would be considered “least likely” to be chosen to lead. No one would have suspected Rahab would be chosen to guide the spies from the children of Israel to safety. Yet she not only led, she is listed in the lineage that would result in the birth of King David and Jesus.

In all of this we can be tempted to get drawn down so many rabbit trails as believers when it comes to our view of “calling” and what that means or might look like in someone’s life. If we are not in some recognized leadership role, it can tempt us to question if we have a purpose or calling at all.

“Living in a God-speaks-greatness-into-everyone environment can lead to shadows of self-doubt when God isn’t speaking to you.”

From The Sacred Echo by Margaret Feinberg

When that happens, we forget what “calling” means and what it looked like when Jesus started “calling” people during his earthly ministry. When He “called” his disciples, do you hear a defined statement of what that “call” meant for each of them? We get some direction with Simon (a.k.a. Peter), but not the others.

“The call” was simple – “Follow me.”

How releasing to know it is that forthright and direct! But the catch for us is that it isn’t clearly mapped out. He is asking us to follow Him and trust Him with what that means, looks like, and where it takes us. That is a good time to recall the words of Isaiah:

“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord.

 “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”

Isaiah 55:8-9 (NIV)

A number of years ago I read a marvelous book entitled The Divine Embrace by Ken Gire. He begins the book using a metaphor of a dance to describe our relationship with the Lord. He describes what it would be like to be in a ballroom and have the Lord come and invite us to dance, noting we would be unsure of ourselves, wishing we had dance lessons to feel as if we could accept his invitation. That is a good image of what it can feel like to be chosen by Him, called by Him.

“There are places he wants to take us on the dance floor, things he wants to show us, feelings he wants to share with us, words he wants to whisper in our ear. This is what the divine embrace is – an invitation to a more intimate relationship with Christ, one exhilarating, ennobling, uncertain step at a time.”

From The Divine Embrace by Ken Gire.

Perhaps if we look at who we are following or trying to determine what our “calling” is, we need to go back to the basics and first accept his invitation: “Follow me.”

“Don’t be distracted by what others are doing. Don’t worry about the speed, productivity, or efficiency of others. Don’t be concerned with people who look like they’re running in circles. Stay the course. They have their lane and you have yours.”

From The Sacred Echo by Margaret Feinberg

The first disciples chose to follow a man from Nazareth, not someone who looked like the king they expected.

What will you do when he simply says, “Follow me“?

Your answer, my answer, will make all the difference in his call on our lives.

It can be so easy to get caught up in trying to see around the bend farther down the road. Somehow, we can have this crazy thought that if I know what is out there ahead, I can prepare for it, be ready, avoid things, or rise above things.

Sometimes the Lord gives us a glimpse of that bend. He certainly did that with the prophets in the Bible when He sometimes looked much farther into the future, but most of the time our steps happen one at a time with enough light for that step, enough grace for each moment.

Our relationship with the Lord is personal and the path He has in mind is as well, but that doesn’t mean that we are called to be an island or walk out this life in isolation. Each path is personal because He is using each of us in a specific way, place, and time for how He is building his kingdom, his church, his bride. We are being fashioned as part of the design and only He can see the “big picture” and the call that is ours.

We might be thinking “but” or “what if, ” without considering that He knows us better than we know ourselves whether we are prone to look more deeply into ourselves or prefer to take life as it comes. And because we do not know ourselves fully, we can operate in our relationships without a deeper awareness of others.

“Most people don’t want to see inside a person’s soul. They judge by what’s on the outside. It’s easier to look on the outside than to really look on the inside.”

From The Promise of Jesse Woods by Chris Fabry

How much we miss as a result of that small view from the outside! But the Lord isn’t like that at all. Even though He clearly sees the outside of each one of us, He (as no one else) looks into the deepest part of us, sees our soul in whatever condition it may be and calls us anyway. He looks down the path we are on and sets a new direction with clarity about the destination and the purpose beyond our limited view.

It’s clear that the Lord chooses those most of us would pass over because we are looking at the outside.

“For it is one of the most extraordinary aspects of the good news that God uses bad men to accomplish his good purposes. The great paradox of judgment is that evil becomes fuel in the furnace of salvation.”

From Run with the Horses by Eugene Peterson

Some of those “bad men” (or women) are transformed in the process.

Some of those transformations are obvious like when Saul gets stopped in his tracks on the road to Damascus where he was heading to persecute new Christian believers. He is physically blinded so he can discover he has been spiritually blind all along despite his zeal and study of the Torah.

“Jesus never hesitates when it comes to getting personal with his followers.”

From The Sacred Echo by Margaret Feinberg

And that is true before we choose Him as well as after we do. Don’t forget He chooses us first. We are the ones slow on the uptake. And don’t get too much in a twist about what He sees in us. He knows what He is getting from the very beginning.

It is not unusual for us to look out at someone else or pick a biblical hero and see that, but I think He would have us know that it is no different for you and me. He knew us before we were known, before we arrived on the scene we are in. He had the scene set for us.

Those famous disciples of his… Look at how each was unique and so often considered to be the least qualified. Who would have chosen the rough and rowdy Simon (a.k.a Peter)? Yet the moment his brother, Andrew, introduced him to Jesus, Jesus changed his name to Peter, long before He worked on his character. He saw what no one else saw – the rock He would use to establish the church when He ascended into heaven knowing then that Peter would understand the foundational rock was Jesus with whom he had spent three years following after he gave up fishing and became a fisher of men.

And what about Matthew, the tax collector everyone hated, who would have guessed he would be called or be shaped into the man who wrote one of the gospels?

If we look beyond some of the disciples we might hear about the most, have you ever considered what Jesus saw in Nathaniel? He brazenly asked, “Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?” But when Jesus called him as a man whom He sees as not having any guile, He told Nathaniel that He saw him under the fig tree. We have no information about what Jesus saw or what was happening or when that scene took place under the fig tree. Jesus knew him before he was known, before he was called because it’s personal.

“Some of the disciples found Jesus on their faith journey; others discovered Jesus by listening to someone else’s faith journey. In every instance, Jesus was incredibly personal.”

From The Sacred Echo by Margaret Feinberg

Don’t you see it is still the same with each of us?

“Jesus is the same yesterday and today and forever.”

Hebrews 13:8 (ESV)

I love that He is personal with me (and you). When we really tune in and listen to his voice, move beyond reading about Him and enter into relationship with Him, the relationship becomes like no other.

“He says things to us that might be meaningless to someone else, but for us they make all the difference. They make God real and remind us that God is near. When a spiritual truth comes alive in my heart, it transforms me.”

From The Sacred Echo by Margaret Feinberg

“God does not send us into the dangerous and exciting life of faith because we are qualified; he chooses us in order to qualify us for what he wants us to be and do…”

From Run with the Horses by Eugene Peterson

No matter who you are or what your personality type, you and I are all bombarded by words more than ever before. They come at us from every direction and every device and whether we have a love for them or hate them, they influence us even when we don’t plan on that. Sometimes we fall prey to their persuasion while other times we shut down our minds and hearts to the cacophony of them.

I have always been a lover of words and that gets confirmed by one of my primary love languages. That may be true of some of you also, but even if it isn’t the case few would deny a longing to hear words of love, encouragement and affirmation. Whether we acknowledge it or not, we all like to know that we matter in some way to someone.

One of the risks we face is that sometimes we are so hungry for the words that we get caught up in them without clarifying there is substance beyond the words themselves. That theme is front and center in The Idea of Love, a novel by Patti Callahan Henry, where the characters get caught in telling their stories as the people they would wish to be versus who they are. The enchanting story shows how each begins to enjoy the false persona and love starts to appear between two main characters that is based wholly on fictional portrayals.

We seem to be drawn to a good love story whether it is in a movie, book, or the real life of someone we know. We also long for such a story to be one where we have the leading role (even if we don’t admit it).

The challenge in that is not that it is a bad thing, but that it rarely happens like it does in the movies or your favorite novel or love song. Maybe because those focus more on “the idea of love” than what we recognize.

This isn’t something new to this generation. We have always longed to hear what we want to hear across the broad spectrum of our lives. Perhaps that was behind part of the reason Eve fell when she listened to the words used to seduce her to break the one command she was not to do in the perfect world God placed her in.

There is no question that words have power – sometimes for good and sometimes not.

They not only impact our love relationships, but our spiritual lives we well. Paul wrote about this to Timothy and notes how prevalent it will be as the time for the Lord’s return draws near.

“For the time is coming when they will no longer listen and respond to the healing words of truth because they will become selfish and proud. They will seek out teachers with soothing words that line up with their desires, saying just what they want to hear.”

2 Timothy 4:3 (TPT)

So how do we deal with this and determine what is genuine, authentic, and true? With the increase of technology available today it can be easy to get lost in a world of smoke and mirrors meant to cover the intent of the one saying the words or writing them.

An old idiom many of us are familiar with points the way:

“Actions speak louder than words.”

The quoted idiom can be found as early as the 1600’s but was first used in the form we use today in the United States by Abraham Lincoln in his Cooper Union Address. And for whatever anyone may think about this country’s self-taught lawyer who became our 16th President, his life shows the evidence of what he believed by the actions he took.

As a retired clinical counselor, I would tell you that I often would tell the person seeking my help that if the words and actions of a person do not match, believe the actions because they are not easy to fake. A person may say many things, but what he or she does will represent more of their character.

It reminds me of the song “Show Me” in the Broadway show and movie, My Fair Lady, when Eliza sings these lyrics in part to Freddy:

“Words! Words! Words!

I’m so sick of words!

I get words all day through;

First from him, now from you! Is that all you blighters can do?

Don’t talk of stars Burning above; If you’re in love,

Show me! Tell me no dreams

Filled with desire. If you’re on fire,

Show me!”

Lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner

Jesus came to earth. He was the Word. God spoke the Word, but He was and is more than just talk. He demonstrated each day that He was here the truth and reality of everything He said.

As we contend with the barrage of words in this season and how they are used to persuade, deceive, or cajole us Eugene Peterson offers us sound advice:

“If we forget that the newspapers are footnotes to Scripture and not the other way around, we will finally be afraid to get out of bed in the morning. Too many of us spend far too much time with the editorial page and not nearly enough time with prophetic vision. We get our interpretation of politics and economics and morals from journalists when we should be getting only information: the meaning of the world is most accurately given to us by God’s Word.”

Eugene Peterson in Run With the Horses

Excuses. Let’s be honest. We all have them and use them. Sometimes the reasons are valid, but other times not so much. Sometimes we use them without thinking. Many times, we use them because we want to avoid the response we may get if we simply decline to do a particular thing. That can happen because we don’t want to disappoint someone or have someone think less of us. But it can also happen because of what we believe.

The word excuses used as a noun means “a reason or explanation put forward to defend or justify” or “to conceal the real reason for an action.”

That’s pretty obvious and we all know that is what we are doing. But why isn’t it okay to simply say we are tired or don’t have the financial/emotional/relational resources to agree with what is asked? Do we fear being seen as less than, incapable, or inadequate?

If we are honest with ourselves, we generally do have some of those feelings. We want others to think and believe the best about us for many reasons including trying to boost our own uncertainties about whether or not we are. We have a propensity to feel guilty if we decline too.

The issue of feelings of inadequacy are as old as time itself, but it became more popular in recent times as research about the feelings and self-concept formation developed. It is pretty clear the feelings are real, and studies can point to a number of reasons why we experience those feelings. Counselors, psychologists, pastors, and others have tried to help us sort through those feelings and eliminate them with varying degrees of success. (As a retired clinical counselor, I am well acquainted with dealing with the issue and some of the most effective tools to combat it.)

But despite my training and experience of many years, I must confess that I am not sure we are effective at totally eliminating the feelings. We face new challenges and require new skills as we go along and they can stir up that sense of inadequacy pretty quickly for most of us and then we can be tempted to wonder what happened when we thought we had dealt with it and conquered it years ago.

Feelings of inadequacy are not academic for me either. I have experienced them more than a few times in my life. They were once generalized across many things, but over time they most often popped up when I was faced with something new such as starting graduate school in my late 40’s, leaving a solid teaching career to enter the risky business of clinical counseling in private practice, creating a website where I put myself “out there” for many to evaluate and judge, and authoring a book at the age of 75. Trust me, I get it, and these are only a few of the examples in my own life I could offer you.

It’s also true that each time I have risked facing such a new thing for me, I have become a bit stronger and yet without eliminating the feeling completely.

In reading Eugene Peterson’s book, Run with the Horses, I began to see something about this common challenge with greater clarity. You see, if we delve a bit deeper into our excuses and sense of inadequacy, we also might see how often it has delayed our obedience to something God has asked of us. A quick review of the Bible stories we know shows us we are not alone. An easy example is when we look at Moses who says he can’t speak well enough to do what God has asked of him.

I understand that excuse too. Earlier in my life I was asked to consider a leadership position in a women’s ministry organization. I felt totally inadequate. My reasons were many and also valid. I was too young (in my early 30’s) and my spiritual maturity did not match my enthusiasm. I still saw myself as the girl from a small farm who had lived most of her life in the country and this position was a chapter of an international organization that met in a larger city not far from me. (Yes, it was a “Frodo” moment.)

As I prayed about it for one of the only times in my life, I saw a clear picture as the Lord began to nudge me to accept. Some of it is too personal to share, but it involved seeing a stunningly beautiful dress the Lord had designed for me to wear and his disappointment were I not to accept what He was calling me to do.

Obedience can be hard, but failure to do so grieves the Lord. We also miss out on the opportunities that obedience sets in motion, the faith it develops by what we learn about Him as well as ourselves. But guess what? He has a purpose for asking us to do hard things.

“There is an enormous gap between what we think we can do and what God calls us to do. Our ideas of what we can do or want to do are trivial; God’s ideas for us are grand.”

Eugene Peterson in Run with the Horses

What truth there is in that! Who would have guessed he would have chosen a rag tag group of fishermen, a tax collector, and women to be the ones that would spread the gospel around the world? They seemed some of the least likely of the day. They often let him down with their unbelief and even betrayal, but yet He called them and used that call to shape them and now their lives, words, and testimonies help shape us 2,000 years later. That is a grand plan indeed.

I think Paul understood what the source of our adequacy is to be as he wrote to the church at Corinth:

“Not that we are sufficiently qualified in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency and qualifications come from God.”

2 Corinthians 3:5 (AMP)

“In the way of faith we do not escape because it is too much for us; we plunge into it because we are commanded and equipped. It is not our feelings that determine our level of participation in life, nor our experience that qualifies us for what we will do and be; it is what God decides about us.”

Eugene Peterson in Run with the Horses

Let us never offer excuses to God for our lack of obedience as well as learn to know his voice so well, we recognize when it is He that is asking.

Photo by Pixabay from Pexels

Throughout every day we are all bombarded by messages that come to us from every direction. They arrive as voicemail, text, email, memorandum, and even through “snail mail” crammed into our mailboxes. Some of them are ones we are eager to hear or get and others are not. Sorting through all of them consumes time and no matter how we may have felt when this barrage first started, most of us are weary of all the time this takes out of our day (or night).

Each message (wanted or unwanted) requires a decision from us of some sort. Often that means we need to give or leave a response as well and that means we add to the clutter of messages because we add to them. Sometimes we are stunned on a day without many messages to deal with but that would be rare because many of us write messages or notes to ourselves to remember one thing or another.

Most messages come as print, audio, video, or mixed format for us. But there is something about this that we can miss in our snowstorm of messages each day.

Each of us in our person is also a message. I was reminded of that while reading in 1 Thessalonians when Paul writes to the church in Thessalonica:

“The word has gotten around. Your lives are echoing the Master’s Word, not only in the provinces but all over the place. The news of your faith in God is out. We don’t even have to say anything anymore—you’re the message!”

1 Thessalonians 1:6-7 (MSG)

Paul is stating plainly that these people had heard the message of God’s Word and it had so changed and impacted who they were in every area of their lives that they had become the message.

This wasn’t about writing down something for someone or telling someone in just words. This was a complete transformation of who they were so every aspect of behavior, speech, nonverbal expression, and choice reflected how the Word had been engrafted into them.

And people noticed.

What a message all they met or interacted with must have received, but what about us now?

We also are a message to everyone who encounters us or observes us whether we intend that or not. We convey who we are to more than those we are intentionally wanting to communicate with. We, the message, are given to our neighbors, postman, cashier, waiter or waitress, mechanic, and hundreds of others every day who observe us whether up close or at a distance. Our values and choices are conveying who we are – we are a message.

Many of us may not actually know our neighbors well. Beyond waving or saying “hello” other interactions may not happen, but the message of us gets conveyed in hundreds of ways – when and how our trash cans are left out, how we handle our lawn and landscaping, whether we scream at others who live with us, if we train our children and animals to respect property, whether we work nights or days, or are regularly seen heading out to worship on a Saturday or Sunday. All these are our message to the world and when all these messages are combined, they convey quite a sketch of us.

That can be funny or sobering to consider.

But in all the places we live and move each day is there evidence that we are believers in Christ? If so, is it because we have told them, or they have seen us carrying a Bible with us or is it because they see or sense something more? Does Christ’s life in us cause us to be a fragrance (as Paul wrote to the Corinthians) that distinguishes our message beyond the words we say or the things we carry? Whether we intend to or not we are the message and for some, the only message they will really see or read to gain a sense of whose we are. Does who we tell them we are match the message of us?

It can be far easier to say who we are than to have the message of us actually convey the words we say.

The message of us will always be the one others remember more than what we may say to them. Do our convictions need to be strengthened so that we don’t need to plan or think through the message second by second? What happens with the messages we take into us through all and any means? It is certain they shape and impact us and the message that we become.

The Apostle Paul spoke to that as well when he addressed the church at Thessalonica:

“When the Message we preached came to you, it wasn’t just words. Something happened in you. The Holy Spirit put steel in your convictions.”

1 Thessalonians 1:5-6 (MSG)

Do we need more steel in our convictions to live authentically each moment of each day?

However we choose to answer that question, or live each day, let us remember this – we are the message.