How Bold Can You Go?
That’s right …. how bold can you go? And it’s okay to sing it because now I can’t stop.
It turns out that when you embrace the truth of your design, it’s an empowering truth that sparks a hunger to go even bolder.
Your One Purpose
You are designed for one purpose …
Just one …
And that one purpose is to be in a relationship with God.
The rest of this journey is secondary to that one purpose.
And without that one purpose, everything else will be out of balance.
Always.
Every single time.
Without exception.
- No matter what that pastor told you
- or your Sunday school teacher
- or your grandmother (gasp)
Until you are aligned with God in that unique and personal relationship with Him through His Word (which is Jesus), then you will struggle.
Okay, now I’m stepping on my toes.
Not cool.
Confronted By How Bold I Have Gone
The other day, I had to confront the truth that I was not ALL IN with God.
Oh, I talked a good game, but it was all talk.
Or mostly talk.
I was still holding on to the edge of the Spiritual pool.
In 2020, when the insurance company didn’t make us whole and left us broken – emotionally, physically, and (almost) spiritually – we had to let go of what was and that required releasing the side.
But, we stayed close enough that we were able to grab hold of the side again. Keith got a job. I found freelance work. Things moved forward … although it was an extremely bumpy ride.
When everything crashed around us and we sold the property, and sold our possessions, and packed up to move what little we had left, we had to let go of the side and fully trust God for each step. He showed up time and time again.
But the people around us fed us a lot of “yes, but” requirements about how to keep going forward.
“Yes, you do have a unique purpose, but you have to work for your bread.”
“Yes, you do have a calling, but you still have to give to Cesear what is Cesear’s.”
“Yes, you are lifted up by God, but you have to live in this world, and it requires payment.”
AHHHHHHHH!
It frustrates me to no end to face these YES, BUT conversations.
God is a God of YES! And only once has He shown His BUT …. T (don’t believe me … Exodus 33:23)
And yet, I found myself wading around in the shallow end, dipping my toe in at the steps, or clinging to the sides.
All in … that’s just crazy talk.
Or the people around me kept throwing the YES, BUT at me until I believed that going all in with God had to be the crazy thing. How could so many other people be wrong?
Did you hear that?
I had come to a place where I was believing people over God because there were so many of them who told me it had to be true.
How silly it sounds when I hold it up that way. And how bold I had to be to choose that path (and not in a good way)
The confrontations started up a few weeks back. They kept telling me how things would be if I didn’t comply … or should I say CONFORM. And one day it hit me:
SO WHAT?
The Power of So What
So what if they put it on my permanent record?
So what if they put it on my credit report?
So what if they tell my mom?
So what if they whisper behind my back? (they do that anyway, right?)
SO WHAT?
It’s like a weight rolled off my shoulders. As soon as I declared, “So what,” it didn’t matter as much. The more I said it, the less power it held.
It wasn’t that I was dismissing the ramifications of choices past. It wasn’t even that I was ignoring the declarations they were making. It was that I had made the determination that I would do what I heard God leading me to … the things being fed into my heart through consistent investment with Him in His Word and in prayer with Him. And I was choosing the God things over the things of the world – even the things the world told me were good.
From So What, World to What Now, God
When Keith and I created the Abundant Life Program workbook and began developing 24-week courses, 1-day seminars, and weekend conferences, the roots of WHAT NOW, GOD were placed.
Instead of wondering about the why of something that had happened, we decided to lean into what God wanted us to learn or gain or do through the circumstances … and sometimes IN those circumstances.
When I combined the power of SO WHAT with the focus of WHAT NOW, GOD, the change was instant. Because the world lost its grip and God gained my full focus.
And when the YES, BUT people showed up, SO WHAT screamed in my head.
PRO TIP: You don’t need to scream SO WHAT at them. They don’t have ears to hear anyway.
Daniel did it. When the other leaders feared his power, they tricked the king into creating a law that would kill Daniel. Daniel heard the law, he said, “So what?” And then they threw him in the lion’s den, where Daniel cried out, “What now, God?” And God said, “I’ve got this.” And He shut the mouths of the lions.
How bold do you have to be to stare at the hungry lions and declare, “So what?”
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were told without getting down and worshiping the idol, they would be thrown in the fire. “So what,” was their response. And when they were thrown in the fire, they said, “What now, God?” And God said, “I got this.” An angel came and walked with them in the fire, protecting them from the heat so much that they didn’t even smell like smoke.
And if you’ve ever been chased by the smoke at a campfire (IYKYK) then you understand how amazing not even smelling like smoke was.
Peter and John did it. They were preaching Jesus when the leaders threatened them. “So what,” Peter and John said … although they were a little more professional in the rebuke. “We must obey God rather than men.” Peter and John walked away declaring, “What now, God?” And God said, “I got this.” And the Holy Spirit showed up and shook the house so that they went speaking even bolder.
What about Micah? Or Esther? Or Jeremiah?
The list goes on and on. Consistently, when faced with the world’s demands, the people of God say, “So what, world?” What can man do to me? And then they say, “What now, God?” And God shows up.
Every
Single
Time
And God will show up … has shown up … is showing up for me every single time I choose to lean into Him and GO ALL IN instead of trusting the world and accepting the YES, BUT.
How bold they were, not because they were smarter or stronger or faster … but because they put their relationship with God first. The relationship with God, the one purpose for existence, was the first step, and that step made room for the rest of it.
Are you ready to shake off the limits of the world?
All it takes is jumping into the deep end of the Spirit.
The world doesn’t want us going all in. As long as we hold back, we miss out on the abundant life God has for us. I feel a deep connection and call to get the word out … or in this case the two words … out.
SO WHAT? How to embrace the power of the two words that break the lies of the world and fuel the pursuit of a life all in with God.
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