Runaway

I hope you can enjoy the (not-so clever) Bon Jovi reference for the title of this week's blog post, but more importantly it brings us to our topic for further discussion this week. If you were at church on Sunday then you know that for the next four weeks we'll be talking about the Bible's favorite runaway, Jonah (don't get all "Bible quiz-bowl" on me and point out the prodigal son...it's a fictional story). The book of Jonah recalls the story of a prophet of God (this is Jonah), who is called to leave Israel (his home), and go preach against the Ninevites (these are the people Jonah's afraid of). Since the Ninevites are a group of people who strike fear into the hearts of the nearby nations (including Israel), Jonah is understandably a little nervous about telling them that God will destroy them. So, instead of following the will of God, which was laid out before him, Jonah decides to charter a boat and run from God, which is never a good or logical plan. As most of you know, things don't go according to Jonah's plan, but that's not the point of this blog post. What I'd love for you to take away from this story is that we all have, currently are, or are going to find ourselves in a place where we will know the will of God, but be tempted to runaway from it. Most often we choose to runaway from the will of God because, just like Jonah, we're afraid of what might happen to us.

How does one know what God's will is? When Christ left our planet to fight the evil Cylons to save the planet Caprica...wait, that's not right...What I meant to put was when Jesus ascended into heaven (which also has a sci-fi feel to it, but I guess since He came back from the dead, I can believe anything), Christ left us a "Counselor", who is the Holy Spirit, and when you become a Christian, by believing and accepting what Jesus did on the cross to forgive you of your sins so that you can live in relationship with Him, the Holy Spirit lives in you (John 16:5-11). The Holy Spirit is probably the most powerful way, that God communicates His will to us. Have you ever felt the feeling that you should go talk to someone or do something that you don't quite understand, and later on you realized that it probably would have been the Christ-like thing to have done? If you have, that was probably the Holy Spirit prompting you to follow God's will. However, sometimes out of fear of rejection, being mocked, or just because we don't want to stand out, we choose to ignore those promptings. God also lays out His will through the Bible, by giving us guidelines to live by, but because we want to "fit in" often we push against these boundaries. We choose to ignore gossip in our conversations, because we don't want to be gossiped about in return. We join in inappropriate sexual activity, because you're not really a "man" or an "adult" until you do. We get involved in a multitude of activities which we know to be against God's will, but because of our fears we, like Jonah, choose to run from God's will and miss out on what He's doing in the world.

God is constantly doing work in our world, and He has called us to join Him in changing lives all around us. However, if we let our fears dictate our behavior, then we'll never fully embrace and enjoy what God has in store for us. Jonah foolishly believed that he could outrun the God of the universe, how long do you think you can? You can try and avoid the guilt you feel from the sin that has trapped you or you can continue to ignore where it is God's will is pulling you, but you'll miss out on everything God could do through you along the way. Maybe through serving in the church you could be apart of bringing someone to Christ, maybe through overcoming a sinful habit you could be an example to others, maybe God just wants you to fill up someone's car with gas, or maybe He wants you to stand up for someone that needs a kind word, but all of these things require you putting your fears aside and choosing to run "with" God instead of "away" from Him. Are you getting tired from running? All of your guilt and regret weighs you down, God just wants you to lay all of that in front of Him, so you can run together, and together make a difference in this world.

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Pray
That you can have the courage to lay your fears aside, and run "with" God.