Where We Live

Most of us like where we live.  Where we like to live is where we are most comfortable.  It is where we think we are in charge and have some control over whatever it is that is ahead.  We like living where everything is familiar, adds up like a ribbon tied around a birthday present, and creates a sense of security.  If such is what we would choose for our life, it is going to be impossible to live faithfully as a believer in Jesus Christ.  Faith is not about being where everything is nailed down, but living where all of life is constantly changing.

 

All the sojourners of the Scripture found themselves going where they knew not where.  They were called from familiar surroundings to strange places.  They were called to embrace a way of life for which they were not prepared.  They did not always know where they were going when they started out.  They traveled without a view of the whole road, but instead saw a piece of it just ahead.  Out of their comfort zones they were called into a place where making it would mean turning loose the controls of life and letting God do whatever it was that God desired to do.

The perimeters of a life of faith in Christ has not changed much at all since those days.  In the beginning we have this view of faith that makes us think that we can by our own efforts muster enough to overcome anything.  However, thus far it has not worked.  The kind of faith the Word of God calls us to embrace takes us into the arena of the uncomfortable.   The way God works is to start moving us just when it seems that we are getting settled.  The familiar is where we are in control and there can be no growing faith in that place.  A growing faith requires moving toward the place where we must depend on Him to live and that is never in a place where we are comfortable.