August 2009Today Newsletter2

Many mornings of our boys’ early childhood, school experience began with Carol entering the boys’ room, opening the blinds while proclaiming:

Good Morning! Good Morning! Good Morning!Time to lift your sleepy head;Time to tumble out of bed.It’s a brand new day!Their response was varied, as you can

imagine, but never once did they say, “Mom, we can hardly wait to go to school, do our homework and be what you want us to be.”

Why? Leaving.To go, do and be requires leaving.Leaving a comfortable bed, a place

of comfortable relationships, going out alone—facing the unknown.

To leave is the most difficult part of what I shared last month in this column: Go…Do…and Be.

The first step of faith in going is the step of leaving. Leaving, as Bill Hybels calls “the zone of the known for the zone of the unknown.”

You can’t go unless you first leave.In Genesis 12:1, “The Lord had said

to Abram, ‘Leave….’” (NIV)“Leave….”“Leave (emphasis is mine) your country,

your people and your father’s household and go (emphasis is mine) to the land I will show you.”

Leave whatever, why ever, wherever, whenever, however for whatever, why ever, wherever, whenever, however. Complete obedience of the body, soul, mind and spirit to the Invisible God, embracing His vision of the Kingdom.

“So Abram left….” (Vs. 4) His first act of obedience: leaving. Leaving the comfortable for the uncertain. Leaving the past for new pastures.

Leaving is the first act of obedience in going.

Abram left to go where God was calling, for what God was instructing him to do and to be a blessing (vs.3).

By faith Abram left with hope for what God promised. In this journey, faith pushed him forward and away from the “zone of the known,” while hope pulled him to the “zone of the unknown.” In between faith and hope there was risk. Abram was going to a place he had never been. But the God of the call was the God of the journey, the Lord of the “way” just as Jesus is for us.

Risk involves change. Abram left the center of his existence for the edge where there was a promise of a new life. Risk, with change followed. Repeatedly, Abram was tested and with each testing came a changed view of the God he was following.

Through the act of following God on God’s terms, the way became clearer for Abram. Eventually, God even changed his name from Abram (exalted father) to Abraham (father of many nations).

One other observation: in between Abraham’s faith and hope was love. He had the fellowship of God’s love and love from his family community. This is no small matter for the follower of God.

God calls us to a journey of faith with a promise of hope (both now and for eternity). In between faith and hope is risk, but there is, also, love: His and the love of fellow travelers/sojourners. The former includes the k indness and direction of our Ultimate Loving Guide. The latter offers what Eugene H. Peterson in his book, The Jesus Way, calls the “priesthood of mutuality.” We are a royal priesthood, followers of Jesus – a community living with a “willingness to [mutually] guide one another in the following of the way of Jesus.”

We were never meant to leave alone, or go, do and be alone. We need God and others of faith.

So church:Good Morning! Good Morning! Good Morning!Time to lift your sleepy head;Time to tumble out of bed.It’s a brand new day!Leave…Go…Do…and Be engaged in

what God is doing!

Pastor Doug HolckExecutive Pastor

Pastoral Search Committee:Be sure to check the PC website the first

week of August for a video update on the progress of the Search Committee.

Leave: The Most Difficult Part

Advanced Training Manual

Peoples ChurchFresno, CA

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