I have decided that blogging isn't an easy mix with my unofficial ADD.
One thing that I've been thinking a lot about the last couple days is the idea of stepping out and making plans to advance God's kingdom (which is a pretty nifty thing). Lately I have been in the mindset that one should wait until God had specifically(-ish ("-ish" because usually His plans aren't long term, 20 year vision plan specific)) revealed to them His plan for them. Yesterday, a nifty guy Taylor and I had a meeting with kind of a missionary recruiter and at one point the recruiter asked me if 100 missionaries showed up at my door asking where to go, where I would send them (He had earlier spoke about the 10/40 window where much of the unreached people groups are). I was kinda bamboozled and I asked him if these missionaries had any indication from God where they were called, and he said no. I then said "Well, I'd hope that God would reveal to me where they are to go." He then was probably a little frustrated and just wanted me to answer the question and said that God had revealed to them that I would tell them where to go, but apparently God didn't reveal to me specifically where they were to go.
It was a toughie as I have felt that to step out in faith on something that God hasn't specifically revealed can be a dangerous thing. I had believed that it can definitely be a good thing, but I have felt that it can also be risky spiritually as you could be just banking on something based on your own preconceived plans that you have put before God and ordered Him to sign off on.
I had heard a story of how some individuals somewhere in Eastern Asia had been trying to make it to a revival meeting happening on a large hill. There had been a lot of rain and a small river had flooded and was flowing very rapidly. A group of young adults had reached the river and it was blocking their way to the meeting and a few of them declared that they would have faith that God would bring them through the waters and they began worshiping God and then ran into the waters but were swept away and their bodies were eventually found a couple days later. It's definitely a sad story but it carries a lot of lessons in it, that to step out in faith in something that God hasn't revealed to us can be not the best thing for us spiritually and in this case physically. In the book "Adventures in Naked Faith" by missionary Ross Tooley he says that faith exploits like these "had failed in at least one key area. We acted on our own, not at God's prompting. We ignored the fact that God specially spoke to Moses at the burning bush to lead the people of Israel out of Egypt. It was not Moses' idea. We forgot that the walls of Jericho fell down because God specifically spoke to Joshua to march around that city seven times. We failed to see that it was God who gave Elijah the idea of calling fire down from heaven." (I hope that's sound, if you disagree, let me know as that would be swell.)
For example, when Peter walked on water, he asked Jesus if he could first and Jesus gave him the go ahead. It would be a radically different thing for Peter to just feel like he could do it, he knew that he should ask first. Tooley said on the subject, "it would be foolish of him to attempt this without some word from God. He needed guidance."
I guess I had applied that lesson to things such as faith exploits in carrying the Gospel around the world, but now I feel like that my reasoning has been off for that category.
The main thing being that we aren't stepping into the water without any prior approval. While God hasn't declared that he wants everyone to go to their nearest bodies of water and go water walking, God has made it clear throughout His word that He desires for the Gospel to be carried to all peoples. I believe that if God hasn't given special revelations to individuals and groups of people to go to a specific place to do a specific thing that it doesn't discount the general revelation that He has given to all believers to make Him known among the earth and that our plans can be used for His glory if we are in the center of His will and are aware that at any second our plans could change by His guidance.
Now, a video that I think is pretty powerful:
