Proving What's Possible

And looking at them Jesus said to them, 

“With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”  

Matthew 19:26

At one point I felt compelled to make the move, meaning that there was no way I could NOT do it.  I was meant for more.  I pulled the plug, and jumped.

If I hadn't made the jump out of my meaningful, but soul-numbing career path, and into the purpose-filled vision I held of my future:

I'd never have seen myself as someone who could actually have impact

I'd never have given meaningful work to people with special needs

I'd never have given opportunities to homeless men

I'd never have funded an orphanage and medical clinic in Guatemala

I'd never have proven that it's possible for business to be a powerful mechanism for expressing compassion in a community

I'd never have my own platform upon which to play out the substance of my faith and the desires of my heart

I'd never have seen how good I am, and how bad I am

I'd never have stared my naked failures in the face, and gone forward anyway

I'd never have something worth persevering for

I'd never have set an unattainable goal, and surpassed it

I'd never have known how far I could go

I'd never have a tool to embody every noble aspiration of mankind: to earnestly reflect the image of God on earth.

I can't tell you how stinking empowering this is.

I've started something.  These are all things I've begun in my first 9 months after leaving my career, and launching out into the life of applied faith and self-determination.  You can't say you're not a person of faith, either.  Maybe you believe in yourself.  Maybe you don't believe in yourself.  I believe in God, and that He made me for this.

The rest of my life will now be a grand experiment in whether my faith is meaningful in the world.  Because if it is, it will result in exceeding goodness for others.  

Here are some things I believe the world will see because I have jumped:

• Compassionate employment for people with special needs and for the hurting and broken (read: homeless). Development of new models for this.
• Recidivism among felons in Raleigh replaced by envisioned men owning businesses and leading their communities out of hopelessness
• Real reduction in infant mortality in Guatemala (the country with the highest infant mortality rate in Central America- but not for long.)

And here is something that is completely out of reach for me to accomplish, but I cannot help but lay it out here: 

To start a movement.
To go first, prove what's possible, and encourage anyone who will listen, to lay hold of that for which they were laid hold of.

This is for people with faith in God. Who believe that God has a purpose for them, and who would race to that purpose if they knew what in the world that looked like.  I believe it looks like this. Like what I've done. Like what I'm doing.  What I'm doing is everything that comes into my path to do, and do it with a bare conscience before God.  Doing everything that is in my heart to do- all of it.  It looks like seeing with eyes of faith who God made you to be, and racing to become that with acts of that faith.  Risky, jumping from the nest, acts of faith.  

I define faith as believing in the goodness and trustworthiness of God's nature- that he is mighty to save those who jump from the nest and look to Him to bear them up.  Not for their own purposes, but for His.  A person of faith lives not for himself, but for God.  And God is Love.  What does that look like?  This is what it looks like to me.  How you have come to see that, and display it, is your calling in this life.  So join this movement, jump from the nest, and cast yourself upon the faithfulness and promises and nature of God.  You will never be the same.