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Monday, January 03, 2005
My travel agent unintentionally mislead me.
See, I was planning our student ministry's trip to Holland and there's a travel agency that I used to help with many of the arrangements. When I received the itinerary, I noticed that we had a 1.5 hour time frame on the return flight to make our connection.
On a domestic flight, that's usually not an issue. This was different. We were RETURNING to the USA froma foreign nation. That meant clearing customs, reclaiming baggage, re-checking baggage as well as clearing new security measures...THEN getting to the gate, getting our boarding passes and getting on the plane.
"Is that going to be a problem, that hour-and-a-half time frame with everything we'll have to do clearing customs? I mean, shouldn't we get a later connecting flight?" I asked the travel agent.
"Oh, no. We do this all the time. They have a special customs area for European travellers in Chicago. It won't be an issue," she said.
Well, it was an issue.
I asked the flight attendant while on the flight where this "special customs area" was located so we could make our connection. She said she'd never heard of one. She said we had absolutely no chance to make the connection out of Chicago back to Dallas. "Clearing customs alone will take 45 minutes," she informed me.
But I was dealing with 15 teenagers (and two other adults) who wanted to get home to their families after being away from three weeks. Not making the connecting flight would put me in a position of these 15 teenagers and flying "standby" and trying to get three or four kids on each connecting flight and making sure an adult was with each one.
So, with major headaches in front of me, I gathered the teens, and told them that things looked bleak and what those travel headaches would mean to them personally, and then asked them if they wanted to make the first flight. The team responded with a resounding "YES!"
Because they understood what was in front of them, since making the flight would keep the team together (hence more fun), that they would be seeing their families and eating familiar fast food and sleeping in their own bed that night, I could then point URGE them to do things to ensure that might happen.
And they did. They ran a mile to customs instead of walked. They pleaded with a guard to let us enter the country through the empty lines across the hallway (which were, indeed, special customs areas for African flights...we were just in the European one which had 6 flights land within a half-hour of each other) instead of standing dignified and patient in the VERY crowded one we were in. They helped with all the baggage instead of their own at baggage claim & reboarding. They jumped on crowded trains to get us to security. They begged and pleaded at security to get them to open an unused one special for us (which they did, unexplicably) and then literally sprinted another 10 minutes from security to the next gate...laughing and encouraging each other even though we were cutting it close.
We got there with 10 minutes to spare before take-off. Sweating. Laughing. High-fiving. You get the picture.
But it was URGENT. In order to accomplish this particular thing, we were going to have to live with urgency for an hour and a half. Making split-second decisions. Doing things that were uncomfortable physically & emotionally. There was no time for coffee and lunch and comfort. Nope, this was URGENT. And without URGENCY, we'd fail.
Which is why I'm intrigued by what Paul tells us in Romans 12: 1, "I urge you, therefore, bretheren..."
He's urging us. The dictionary defines "urge" as "to demand earnestly" and "to undertake an accomplishment swiftly and enthusiastically." And Paul is URGING us to do something.
The word "therefore" is used...and this is a key to why Paul would urge us to do something. See, in 11:33, it says, "Oh, the depth of the riches, both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways!"
Since the depths of riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God are unfathomable and unsearchable...since we can't even imagine what God wants to do both in us and through us...since we can't dream of what it would be like to know Him truly intimately...since it won't hit our brains what His ways are like...
Paul URGES us, based on the reality that God is merciful to us...
"to present your bodies as a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship."
To present our bodies. Who we are. Everything that makes me "me." To tell God something like, "Here I am, God. Whatever you want me to do. Whatever you want me not to do. Whatever you want me to say. Whatever you want me not to say. Whatever you want me to think, breathe, move, shake...whatever you want. It's yours. My body and everything in it. You can have it to do with precisely what you want."
That is being alive.
That is being holy (set apart for a specific purpose).
That is acceptable to God.
This is worship.
Sometimes we view worship as the songs we sing before the sermon. Or maybe giving while someone is singing something special.
But worship is being alive.
Being holy.
Being acceptable to God.
Because He is merciful to us.
And it is living life as it was truly meant to be lived. Sure, it'll be uncomfortable and I'd suggest that it takes a TON of courage to tell God that whatever He wants for me that day that He can have it. I mean, I know what I want to do, say, or think, and how often that isn't what God wants me to do, say, or think. I mean, I know how different God is than I am...and to open up to God...
...to worship Him...
...by offering myself...
...that is an adventure.
And Paul is urging us to go on it. With all the unknowns. With all the potential trip ups and hang ups and bang ups along the way. We're being urged...
...to live like we were meant to live.
And the question today is, "Do we have the guts to be a living sacrifice?"
Urgency: demanding us. wanting us to undertake it swiftly and with enthusiasm.
How do we respond?
Brent 6:04 AM
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