Advent: stepping out.

Advent. We are in a season of waiting. Each of us waits in different ways; for different things. We have each created our wish lists. Waiting invites us each to step out in faith.

Over these last few weeks as I have wandered my way through the Jesse Tree - this array of intriguing characters that makes up the lineage of Jesus - I have found myself captivated by the theme of faith, people waiting in faith. Waiting for Emmanuel, God with us.

This theme of stepping out in faith has come at me in numerous ways over the last week and a bit in particular. It started with the story of Abram and Sarah in Genesis 12. God calls out to Abram and tells him to go; to go with his wife, to take what he can carry, leave his home and extended family and start walking to the place where God will instruct him. Those are the instructions. Many details are left out. Abram's task was only to go and to be obedient as he followed. Talk about stepping out in faith! Abram obeys and God's promise for him as a result was great. God has this wild plan to make Abram into a great nation with many descendants. This is radical because at this point, Abram and Sarah have no children. They are beyond child-bearing years. No doubt they probably looked like fools by friends and family. Yet, they step out in faith, trusting that God is not only promising to be with them, but that God sees the bigger picture, even when at the moment, nothing seems to make a lot of sense.

Stepping forward a few hundred years, during the height of Jesus' ministry on earth, we are brought to the story of Peter walking on water in Matthew 14:22-36. While sitting in staff meetings last week, I was reminded of this story and again, the call to step out in faith. 

Quick synopsis of the story. A storm is brewing on the water. Jesus is on land and his disciples are in a boat on the lake. While the is storm is raging, Jesus steps out on the water and begins walking toward the boat. Immediately the disciples are afraid, unaware that it is Jesus, who is walking toward them. After walking and talking with Jesus for awhile now, the disciples continue to doubt when Jesus says to them, "Do not be afraid. Take courage, I am here". To test the validity of what is going on here, Peter steps out in boldness and asks to come out on the water too and Jesus invites it. Peter steps out of the boat and onto the waves and finds himself actually walking on water. It doesn't take long before doubt sets in and just as quickly as he stepped out of the boat, he begins to sink beneath the waves until Jesus comes and pulls his head back above water and sets is feet back in the boat. 

I applaud Peter and his courage in wanting to step out of the familiar and enter the water; to practice bold faith. Like Abram, Peter is given little detail about how exactly this whole walking on water is going to work. The physics and math of it all do not come into question. His heart truly desires to be obedient in faith. But, like us, Peter is human and his faith falls short. Doubt sets in and he quickly finds himself sinking, but he even though there is failure that is experienced on Peter's part, there is obedience and faith in just getting out of the boat! There is no safety promised once you leave the boat, but Jesus is not in the boat - he is on the water.

I have been spending time with Jesus at our meeting place on the rocks by the lake often this week. I have come to Jesus weary and exhausted in waiting; longing to just get the tiniest of glimpses into the bigger picture. I didn't get any details. What I got instead was an invitation to step off of the rocks and onto the water. I was given both a promise and a challenge to walk forward in faith to the place that God is leading me. I am not going to be given the step-by-step process, but rather I am being asked to be obedient and trust that God is out on the water wanting to walk with me - the God who goes before me and behind me, the God who claims me as His own. I am promised a wild adventure in faith, journeying with Jesus. 

So, here I am. Right smack dab in the middle of a season of waiting; a season of waiting expectantly for the impossible. And yet, in my waiting, I am keenly aware of a very present Jesus in my midst, Emmanuel, God with me. There is a call on my life to step out in faith. A call to step out in faith when I am not privy to know the exact timing. A call to step out in faith when the details of the where, when, who, what and how cannot be answered. A call to step out in faith when the thought of stepping off of the rocks and placing my feet upon the water seems incredibly scary. A call to step out in faith when I am unable to see the big picture.

So as my heart prepares to welcome the Emmanuel in a few short days, I choose to wait expectantly. I choose to step out in faith and walk on water with the Christ Child. I choose to be obedient.