What Is Prepared?
September is a month of training camps around AIM. Right now we’re in the thick of World Race camp and New Staff training. In a little over another week we’ll switch out and have FYM camp come in. It’s a month of complete chaos and long hours, but filled with great speakers who spiritually feed us as well as the participants. We also have the chance to speak life into SO many people who are preparing to go. We get to teach what we’ve learned, pray with participants, and counsel some through their struggles as well. It’s been an awesome time where I get to use my gifts in logistics and administration on overdrive and Corey gets to use his gifts in pastoring and discipling in overdrive at the same time! We really do have the greatest job ever.
A few days ago I sat with a racer (Kara Burrows) who is preparing to leave the country in January 2008. Kara is a planner, a person who thinks of every situation and asks the questions on how to deal with those situations. Participants like her are great on trips because they are usually well prepared for most situations. I had just finished leading a seminar on logistics – how to maintain good hygiene, how and what to pack, and dropping your expectations that will lead to disappointments. It was a lot of information in a very short time. Kara came up afterwards with her list of questions and some of us staff gladly sat down to go through things with her. After a while she said something that struck me – “I realized today that I can’t do this. I think that’s where I need to be.”
What Kara meant is that World Race is too big for her. She can’t get all the questions answered. She can’t be prepared for every situation. She can’t look ahead and know that she can handle whatever comes up. And that’s the place where God steps in. In 2 Corinthians 12 Paul regularly boasts about his weaknesses knowing that only when he is living his life pushed to the max – far beyond his personal capabilities – that’s where God shows up.
After talking with Kara, I began to look back at my life. How long has it been since I’ve done something that couldn’t have succeeded without God’s help? I think about our wedding… I’ve dreamt of an outside wedding since before I can remember. Instead of buying a tent or making a backup plan, I simply believed that my intimate and personal God would provide a perfect wedding day. And He did. Was that stupidity and poor planning or faith? Who knows? What matters is that I didn’t do wedding planning based on fear of “What if…” but out of faith.
At the same time, there is something to be said for being a people of action. The whole reason we have training camps is so that we can prepare these Racers as best as possible for as many situations as possible. More than anything, we attempt to give them tools to handle the situations we can’t foresee. I don’t see God encouraging laziness or being unprepared in the name of faith. Maybe there’s a balance?
I’m on the search for that balance. I refuse to live a life of complete safety where I have all the answers. I want to be on the edge, not knowing how everything will work out without God showing up. And yet, I refuse to be completely laidback and let life simply happen to me. I want to be active, pursuing answers and solutions, seeing God directing my steps while I exert the effort to walk. I don’t know what that looks like every day in every situation, but I know that when I’m living that balance, the promise of abundant life is apparent. And that’s the life I want to live.
