Thursday, November 19, 2009

Reflection 3: Enabled by God

Today devotion is about how as Christians, when we walk in His way, are empowered to do great things. It sounds simple... incredibly simple... yet I have failed to display this in my life many many times. I think it's not really because I feel inadequate or uncertain about what I do, but it's more about being comfortable in doing nothing.

This reminds me of a writing by Nelson Mandela:
"Our worst fear is not that we are inadequate,
our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.
We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?'
Actually, who are you not to be?
You are a child of God;
your playing small doesn't serve the world.
There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you.
We were born to make manifest the glory of God within us.
It is not just in some of us, it is in everyone,
and as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.
As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."


Connecting this with my previous reflection: "Can or Can't I?", I believe that great works start with a complete understanding of "I alone can't" which is followed with a journey to figure out that "with God I can".

For me, Moses is the best example for this. Being a prince, he had an attitude of "I can". However, having his life on the line, he ran away and started to realize that he can't really do anything. After years of being a servant and learning about humility, God came to him and called him out. His answer? "Thanks, but no thanks. Simply put-I can't, Lord". God's response? "Oh yes, you can! because I, the Lord, say so". From that moment forward, God used him incredibly to deliver the greatest miracles in the history of Israelite.

One question I often wonder: did Moses still struggle everyday about what God would do? We know from the bible that Israelite did, but how about Moses? There is no record about it. No fear of failure? No second doubt or second guessing God's calling?

One thing for sure, while I've learned about the end of Moses' journey, my journey has just started.

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