The Land That I Will Show You: A "Senseless" Sort of Faith

Now the LORD said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. (Genesis 12:1)

That verse has haunted me for some time. It has haunted me because it tells about the God that I serve. He is the kind of God who doesn't promise creature comforts and holy huddles. He is the kind of God Who asks us to leave what is comfortable and follow Him where He chooses to send us.
I've watched the town of Chattanooga grow from awkwardness and obscurity, to a vibrant city where families want to move. I've seen the story so many times. A family moves there, grows to love it and for some reason their future there suddenly comes into question. I've seen people take a cut in salary or resign themselves to a job that is less fulfilling just to stay within the borders of Chattanooga. That is a wonderful testimony for a town. However, what do you do when the Lord is asking you to leave such a place knowing full well that you may never live within her borders again?

Many of you know that I grew up in Chattanooga. In fact, my family is so deeply rooted in the Tennessee Valley that I haven't even been able to discover how our family got there, only that, somehow, they've always been there. Yet the Lord has been crystal clear in His calling to both me and my family: it is time to go.

More than likely Abraham grew up in the city of Ur. It was his home. He knew the people, the culture and so many other things about that city. He was likely well connected to the social scene in Ur. So, it would've made all the sense in the world for God to use Abraham to preach to and teach the city of Ur. Can you imagine what would've happened if Abraham had stayed in Ur and God allowed him to convert that bustling pagan city? You'll have to imagine, because that wasn't God's plan. It might make the most sense to you and me, but in God's wisdom it did not.

God called Abraham to obscurity; to a land of strangers. He called him to a culture he did not know and a people with whom he was not well connected. Why would the Lord do this? He would do this, because it is and has always been God's "style" to choose people, places and plans that are so "impossible" that it takes the power of God to do the work.

Think about it: David the shepherd boy as a king? Jacob the supplanter (and second born)as the father of the twelve tribes? Leah the least favored wife of Jacob as the mother of Judah the tribe from which Christ would be born. Rahab, a prostitute ,as a helper of the Israelites spies and also an ancestor of Christ. Fishermen as the founders of the new testament church! God loves to choose that which is weak to shame the wise. He chose Abraham to leave a city where he had powerful connections to go to a place where he had to dwell in a tent. That is the God I know.

So it should come as no surprise to me and to others that God would call me and my family from the comfort and the security of Chattanooga to go to the place that He has shown us. The question I get most often is, "Pastor of Children and Youth? But can't you do that here? Aren't you doing that here?" The answer is yes I am, can and could, if God wasn't calling me to do it elsewhere. Just as God called Abraham away from what he knew to what was alien to him, God also is calling us from what is familiar to what is alien to us. I will agree with you, it makes absolutely no sense for me to continue to be a pastor to children and youth if I'm not going to a bigger church. It makes no sense to delay the so-called next step of being a senior or solo pastor. It makes no sense to leave a secure salary to go to a church where I would have to raise support. It makes no sense...unless you know that God is in the middle of all of it and that He has called you to take a step faith. And Tennyson and I do know...beyond a shadow of a doubt.

Continue to pray for us as we go through this test of our faith and we leave our home town, families and our church family to find out what God has in store for us.