obedience

note: listening to new RK album, and enjoying it very much.

i spoke.

perhaps this might seem odd to you, that i am talking about my own journey in this way, but hear me out.

i spoke.

many months ago i felt the proverbial tug on my heart. this tug had a voice, and that voice said, "why don't you go ahead and say something." and then God started to open doors. and the atmosphere that had once made me feel like i was breathing sulfur started to clear. and there was air there. clean air. and so i could move in that place.

i began preparing my heart. it didn't seem so hard to commit to something that was several months out, especially something like speaking at what was then known as worship jam. there was the fear that came with the knowledge that i would be speaking in front of a crowd. that was there. and that didn't really go away. and so part of me said, this is the cost of obedience. this feeling, this insecurity about public speaking, this is the cost.

nope.

then the school year began. and i had to start checking boxes and making time commitments. i had to start attending meetings. all of a sudden i was moving into that atmosphere i was telling you about before. i began to realize that the cost of obedience was higher than i had initially thought. but i was down.

and then some snags came. it became increasingly difficult to justify my involvement. i began to wrestle with my call. could it be that my initial desire to speak was born not of my obedience to the will of God, but of my own subconscious desire to assume a leadership role in a community? ought i to understand this resistance as God telling me i'm going in the wrong direction? or could it be...

that this is a test of obedience.

these ideas circulated in my head for a while, fighting, tearing, biting at each other. for a while i got kind of depressed. it was hard for me to find adequate motivation. but then i started to voice these this crap out loud. it didn't take long for my heart to find true north again. the verdict: a test in obedience.

so i hunkered down, prayed, and tried to develop the balls i would need to do the thing. i wrote me message, and on the first run-through it was about 25 minutes longer than it was supposed to be. whoops.

so i chopped it down, and a few hours later i did the thing.

and i'm not sure yet what i've learned. but i think it has something to do with obedience.

this album is crazy. go nuts.