Weakness and Fear vs. Strength and Courage
I turned 55 a few weeks ago. Let me recount some things – 22+ years as a pastor, in the same place; 26+ years married; 25+years living in the same place. Wow – I’m struggling a bit thinking – man, I haven’t come very far. Things seem more fragile to me than I thought they would be. Things don’t seem as certain as I hoped they would be. I wonder have I done all that God wanted me to do (at least so far)? Have I been faithful?
I can’t tell you how deeply Joshua 1:1-9 has effected me. That passage of scripture just will not leave me alone. I keep thinking – God is gracious, he makes grand promises, he takes the initiative – yet there is no mistaking that He exhorts us ‘Be strong and courageous‘. What does that mean for me – a 55 year old pastor? What does it mean to you who might be reading this?
Over the course of last few weeks it seemed to me like Joshua 1:1-9 was all I could think about. Here was a man, several years older than me, preparing for the biggest deal of his entire life. He spent 40 years serving an apprenticeship which brought him to that moment. He was chosen as a 20 year old to be part of the group who first investigates the Promised Land. He then waits 40 years to finally arrive at the place where he could enter the land. 40 years to come to the place where he would embark on his life’s great purpose. I wonder… how should I judge myself? Have I arrived at the place where I am fit to used to do something really significant? If Joshua took 40 years, who am I to think that my time of formation should be any less? I find myself thinking – I want to think about these things in ways that are realistic, true and biblical. All around me the world is frantic – a woman reaches her 40’s and if she happens to be an actress she is almost certainly near the end of her career. A person who loses their job in their 50’s finds it much harder to find a job, because he or she is thought to be ‘limited’ by their so-called ‘advancing’ years. Yet this is not the way God tells time. God’s economy can include really long periods of preparation.
I could have never thought or grasped these things when I was in my 30’s or even my 40’s. I am beginning to learn that some things just can’t be done without a long, slow development. I think that God has given me a vision of a Biblical counseling center. I can see a place that is multiracial, crossing socio-economic lines and reaching into some of the most broken places in our culture. Ah – but how to get there? I have my own experience, the training I received in graduate school, the things I have learned over the past 20+ years and the hundreds and hundreds of hours of counseling experience from which to draw. These things will help – but this is so much bigger than anything I can do by myself. But like the young lad Jesus called upon when he fed the 5000 (Luke 9:10-17) – I have my two fishes and five loaves and I am prepared offer them. (more…)