Risk is Right

The women’s director at church asked me to give a missionary update last night at the Women’s Ministry meeting. She forgot that she had also asked someone else to give some statistics about unreached people groups and the amount of money given to the unreached (meaning having never heard the Gospel before). Needless to say, I told the other woman to share her data with the group. By the way, for every $100,000 people make, $1 is given to the unreached…Speechless. Let’s just say the room was quiet.

I still feel like I need to say what I feel God laid on my heart. I’m better at typing anyways so I will write this blog and share it. Hopefully, it will make more of an impact this way. 

So I am going to start off by saying that my Bachelor’s degree is in Church Ministries/Missions. I went to Southeastern College AKA Southeastern University 1999-2001. I took courses mostly with guys who wanted to be pastors or youth pastors and a few other females who wanted to be missionaries. I learned how to write sermons and execute them, I took a lot of courses on specific books of the Bible. I think Ezekiel and Jeremiah were my favorites. My advisor was an awesome missions’ professor who taught me about the religions of the world, missionary life and work, cultural anthropology, etc. I graduated a semester early because I wanted to graduate with my friends, but also so I could go to China in August. While I was at SEC, English Language Institute China (ELIC) came to my college class to tell me about the opportunity to teach overseas. I was 21 years old then, now I am 37. I’m leaving July 1^st to return to China for a second time.

                 

I started reading Risk is Right: Better to Lose Your Life Than to Waste It by John Piper. It is a super skinny and petite book with 51 pages. ELIC sent it to me in my welcoming kit. I decided to start reading it, because after all I am on spring break, and I love reading and learning. I think I said, “Wow!” a few times just in the first couple chapters. I got my pen out and started underlining right away.

I’m going to warn you: This won’t be fluff.

“We can rest content in casual, convenient, cozy, comfortable Christian lives as we cling to the safety and security this world offers. We can coast through a cultural landscape marked by materialism, characterized by consumerism, and engulfed in individualism.”

This reminds me of the rat race of keeping up with the Joneses. The newest phones, houses and trucks we can’t afford, 1,000 TV channels, boats, golf carts, the unicorn LuLaRoe pattern…We started the minimalism lifestyle about a year ago. Talk about a weight lifted. We have empty days on our calendar and empty shelves in our 2-bedroom house. I feel like I am living life more fully now than ever before!

Does it matter if my kids’ socks don’t match or that I have a dent in my car, or that I live in a house that is 59 years old, or that I am 2-minutes late for work? Not really.

I wanted to take chicken wings to the women’s meeting last night, but the food bar was empty when I got there. Plan B, a packaged meat and cheese platter! 

 

Did it really matter? Was it worth getting upset about? Do these type of things affect my relationship with God? Do these issues take precedence over the martyrs for Christ? Looking at the big picture, I shouldn’t be getting embarrassed, frustrated, stressed out, or mad about the little things. I’ve started giving myself grace over the trivial events. In the grand scheme of things, I ask myself what is important? To me, the measuring stick for life’s purpose is the Great Commission, mortality, and a person’s eternity.

This is where is starts getting deep.

In the words of Jim Elliot, “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.”

Risk is described as an action that exposes you to the possibility of loss or injury.

“Is losing life the same as wasting it? Of course you can throw your life away in a hundred sinful ways and die as a result. In that case, losing life and wasting it would be the same. But losing life is not always the same as wasting it. What if the circumstances are such that not taking a risk will result in loss and injury? And what if a successful risk would bring great benefit to many people, and its failure would bring harm only to yourself?”

I’ve had quite a few people say to me, “What about the kids?” when they found out I was going to China for 6-weeks. Believe me, I think that is the first thing Joseph asked too. “How can you leave them? What will that do to them emotionally? Aren’t you worried about them being traumatized?”

Yes. I thought about those things, questioned the possibility myself and asked a counselor about their psychological well-being.

Then I remembered He called me.

He gave me peace about it.

Then He gave Joseph peace about it.

And He will give the kids peace about it.

There is risk involved with this decision for my family. There is financial risk committing to raise $4,200. There is a security risk with traveling overseas to a closed, communist country. There is risk involved with the purpose of my trip. There are risks to our family's dynamics being altered and adjustments when I return. I’m going to miss my favorite US holiday and watching the kids’ extracurricular activities. There are risks to my health. I have an introverted personality and I’m going to the largest populated country in the world!

“Risk avoidance may be more sinful-more unloving- than taking the risk in faith and love and making a wrong decision. Doing nothing needs forgiveness as much as doing the best you can and erring. There is hypocrisy that lets us take risks every day for ourselves but paralyzes us from taking risks for others on the Calvary road of love.”

These are individuals in the Bible that took risks and handed the results over to God.

Joab made a decision with his best wisdom and then said, “May the Lord do what seems good to him.”

Queen Esther needed to talk with King Ahasuerus without being summoned, and she said, “If I perish, I perish.”

Paul was a great risk-taker. He was under the risk of persecution many times.

In Acts 20:23, “In every city…afflictions await me.”

I Thessalonians 3:3, “You yourselves know that we have been destined for this [afflictions].”

Jesus said in John 15:20, “If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you.”

We have a Sovereign God and supportive family that will surround Joseph and the kids while I am gone. Also, members of our congregation have offered to “take the kids” to give Joseph a break from time-to-time. The kids will be having fun and being loved at the church summer camp and God has provided 105% of the funds for the trip. The Bible says every follower of Christ is more than a conqueror and that includes me! 

“It is not the impulse of heroism, or the lust for adventure, or the courage of self-reliance, or the need to earn God’s favor. It is simple trust in Christ.”

So for me, it is better to lose your life than to waste it.

What are you willing to risk?

R