zambia ahoy!

shortly after my last post, i was heading to new albany, indiana to lead worship for a friend of mine's youth group, and i decided to stop in louisville to see my best friend T and all of the crossings crew in their main office. well, T was not there, and neither wa david melber, my long time friend and pseudo-mentor (he would claim he is the voice of the holy spirit for me from time to time, and i only mark him a pseudo-mentor because we're not in each other's lives like we once were). but i did get to see lauren, heidi, chris, and reagan, my surrogate brother/sister. as she and i caught up, i mentioned a lot of the things i mentioned on my last posting to her. she responded with an invitation to go with crossings to Zambia in january; they are aiding in the construction and funding of a school-slash-orphanage there.

so i'm heading overseas for a few weeks...if anyone has some money they want to lend a brotha, let me know...

but i am getting fired up about it; amazing that an opportunity to do some overseas work opened up so quickly, and i have a strange suspicion that this could be a watershed experience for me. as i've been praying about what the next step of obedience entails, one thing that continues to come up (along with what i mentioned in the previous post) is the idea of sacrifice. the more i really look at the world, and myself within it, the more i see people with big dreams, big desires, but very little willingness to give up things to get those big ideas out of the brain and into reality. as a whole, that is... the people who are big sacrificers are the exception to the rule, and they accomplish big things, or fall atempting to accomplish big things.

in the faith world, we live with some tough truths: like faith is required to see the kingdom come on earth, and that that kind of faith is the active-doing-believing-truth-so-real-it-moves-us we read about, and not the acknowledging-the-validity-of-but-not-allowing-it-to-transform-anything type. we believe that provision is found within vision; that vision (or calling) supercedes provision, or that believe and you'll see it, and not the other way around. we believe that there is nothing we will give up that God does not fully make up for in His divine ways. yet that means that we belive giving up things is a part of the process, and that we wil have to sacrifice with no clear vision of how God will provide, but believing fully (to the point of action) that He will be as faithful as scripture, history, and His very word testifies.

and if i'm honest with myself, i don't know how much i sacrifice these days. and what i'm praying about seems like it's full of sacrifice, and i'm wondering where to start; what does obedience require of me? maybe i'm making it more than i need to, like there has to be some noble, virtue-filled move instead of the simple abiding life, which is God's true calling for all of us. and i don't want to overlook the fact that paul and many saints after him found that no sacrifice seemed sacrificial when compared to gaining Christ; but i don't want to act like i'm at that point. i just want to come to a point where i'm willing to say yes before He asks, and being that loose-handed with some things is easy, but others require a lot more than i think i've ever given up. and it keeps highlighting a big question for me: do i really believe? do i believe that He's faithful before i see it (though all of my life and everything else proves it) ? do i believe that no sacrifice is a sacrifice compared to what i'll gain (namely Christ Himself)?

as the wise man told Jesus: i believe! help me overcome my unbelief!

wow. is that ever my faith life...

those ponderings aside, life is so wonderul, full, and amazing. andrew murray was right: the more i recklessly depend on the Vine for everything, the more alive and the more confident i become (in Him to be all in all).

and the new Radiohead album in one of the best albums i've ever heard.