PrintPONDERING MY PURPOSE (4)
I now come to the final part of my four-fold purpose in writing for Barnabas Network.
To Stretch the Comfortable
To sound a warning for those who have surrendered their spiritual "cutting edge" in preference for a safer or more comfortable journey and to encourage them to re-engage with their high calling.
The recorded history of God's people is replete with examples of people who started their spiritual journey with great commitment but failed to "finish well". One can turn to the pages of the Old Testament and find many examples of this reality. Turn to the New Testament and make the same discovery. Follow the years right up to this present time and examples continue to mount.
In my own lifetime I've seen too many examples of such failure to become complacent myself. And that's the problem - complacency. In the midst of encouragement and affirmation, I want the articles on this website to also contain a balanced warning to those who are settling for less than the very best. My concern might be summarised by this equation:
Complacency pursues comfort which leads to compromise.
This part of my four-fold purpose is energized to a large degree by my own experience. Time and again over the years I have felt the pulling power of complacency - a magnetism that makes a lifestyle of comfort appear very attractive and legitimate.
This is especially so during those seasons when the going is tough. A small voice seems to whisper that things could be easier if I just let go this conviction or that value. The voice sounds remarkably like the voice that once said,"Did God really say, 'You must not eat from any tree in the garden'?" (Gen 3:1 NIV)
Because of my own experience I can address this issue of complacency, comfort and compromise without any sense of judging others. To judge others would be to condemn myself.
Stretching the comfortable is to call my brothers and sisters to break free from the seductive and deceptive power of compromise and comfort and to renew our commitment to take up our cross each day and walk again with our Master, Jesus.
