Why We Run 2-26-12

Why we Run

I love it when Everett runs. He isn't super stable on his feet yet, so when he grabs something naughty, gives me "the look" and takes off as fast as his unstable legs will carry him, it makes me laugh everytime. Or when I run the vacuum and I literally chase him from room to room. He used to be terrified. Now he just runs with a look of curious fear on his face. His big belly way out in front of his chubby legs. He runs when he is scared. Usually straight into my arms. The other day he dropped a bowl and broke it in the kitchen. I was all of the way in my bathroom getting ready for the day. I heard the bowl drop and break and heard his little feet pattering through the kitchen and his terrified cry. He ran as fast as he could into the the back of the house, where he knew I was. He was scared, and he knew I would keep him safe. 

We do the same thing. We run. From the things that scare us. From the things that are uncomfortable or unfamiliar. We run. Some of us run by being busy. Some of us run to things that make us feel better, but take us further from where we want to be. Some of us run to Jesus. Some of us run to people, or perfectionism, or anger. We run from that which we know God desires because we fear the unknown or the unfamiliar or the cost. So we hold tight to our store bought pearls, missing the beautiful freshwater pearl that God is waiting to give us if we will just hand over our plastic ones. But we run instead. Because we fear. Fear is so very binding. So isolating. So lonely. And so powerful. The anger or the unfaithfulness that destroys marriages..the drama that ends friendships...the arguments that split churches...the core of it all: FEAR. 

So it is no wonder that the night before I set out to do something new and unfamiliar, something good and right, something I feel that God has called me to, my scars were scratched open. Satan knows what fear will do. What it will destroy. But I am onto him. And the fact that he would go so far, orchestrate all of this so that the very night before this new journey begins, the truth comes out. The UT (ugly truth) that peels back those scabs that I thought had long since healed. The UT that leaves me facing all that I thought I had long ago left behind, healed from and worked through. This tells me that what God has called me to is big. That the potential is huge here for God's glory to be revealed and His grace to redeem that which is all but dead. I dont understand it.  But I am going to do my very best to fight the fear. I am not going to run. As the waves hit, I am going to do my best to stand. Besides, I know the Truth: Perfect Love drives out fear. And Perfect Love...is on my side. Now if I can just find the faith to rest in that Perfect Love instead of striving. If only I can learn to stretch out my hand and release my tight grip on my plastic pearls in the knowledge that God's gifts are so very much greater in every way. If I can fight the fear that Satan uses to pull me away from trust, then I will be free. Free to run in redemptive peace and the knowledge of grace. Free to run and free to release. Free.