“You’ve got to be kidding.”
Six weeks ago, that was my gut response when a mentor asked me if I would consider offering myself for deployment to Africa as a risk communication expert for an emergency humanitarian setting for 2 months.
“Ridiculous,” I thought to myself. “Cliff’ll never allow this.”
I wrapped the secret gingerly with disbelief, and threw it away.Weeks later, while preparing for a sermon on Risk, I found myself at the end of the question I asked/would you risk for God? Would you say yes to the risks He presents to you, the only risks worth taking?
My heart quivered. As I said yes to God fearfully, the universe began to shift.
I get an email to be deployed to Congo.
Cliff says yes without a heartbeat. I see tears in his eyes when he says, “I thought about it- if people say how can I allow my wife to go to such a dangerous place, my question would be- how can I not when the needs are so great?”
We are eating lunch and I am silent, picking at my food at the reality of being apart from my family, weighing the costs of it all and my potential evacuation or demise in the worst case scenario when my four-year old, reading my thoughts, snaps me out of my stupor, and says to my surprise, “We’ll pray for you when you’re in Africa, Mama.”
Tears well up in my eyes. I force a smile at her.
“Actually I’m afraid, baby.”
“But you shouldn’t be, Mama. God is with you,” she says emphatically, full of confidence.
“How come you always know the right thing to say?”
She cocks her head to one side, widens her eyes and says without missing a beat, “God just told me!”
In a dramatic turn of events, a zoom call from the deployment representative in Geneva says he overlooked that I’m not French speaking. They’ll relook a match and let me know.
In last weekend’s sermon, the question I asked was- would you risk for God? Would you recalibrate your perceptions of risk and realize the tragic hypocrisy of being enchanted by a security that doesn’t exist?
The truth is- staying in our status quo can be far riskier. Obedience is always the wisest choice, even if it costs us our lives.
Like Abraham, are we willing to lay our own flesh on the altar and surrender all we have, even when there is no explanation, no guarantee of the outcome?
If God is calling you to something deeper, farther, would you say yes to Him, and take the only risk worth taking?
Here’s sharing the message with you.