The morning air was cold, gusting to about 15 mph. The last few days made me aware of just how cold the wind makes Montana. If it weren’t for the wind, it would be extremely pleasant out, even at 28 degrees. The air is crisp and clean, and each breath makes you aware of just how fresh it is. This morning though there is movement in the house. From the guest room I hear footsteps, and the sound of dishes and mugs being moved and taken out of the cabinets. Today was Thursday and I had been here for almost a week. I arrived on Saturday and it seemed each day simply raced by. From horse sales to horseback riding, driving through town, working out in the high school weight room, and numerous other activities that had taken place since I arrived, the days have simply vanished away, leaving only my digital camera and the hundreds of pictures I had taken as a reminder of my memories. This country is beautiful and breathtaking. But that wasn’t why I came. I didn’t come here for the mountain scenery. Nor did I travel here for the hunting. It wasn’t the horse culture and ranches that lured me here. It was the fellowship.
This morning though I have no answer to the questions Tony asks me while driving. The trip to Livingston only takes about 90 minutes from Townsend, but as I try and formulate a response to a simple query from Tony, the drive seems unending. "What is God showing you?" I look him in the eye, then avert my gaze, looking to the road, the fields of alfalfa on either side, the clouds, the snow, the road again. Anything to buy myself some more time to think about this question. I fumble about until I give a somewhat vague, "Nothing I can put my finger on, just a lot of little things." He doesn’t seem to buy this answer, but, unlike Tony, chooses not to push further. This seemed strange though, Tony never was one to give up on an answer he asked the question to. "What does Rob see about Rob?" The question seems to penetrate my blockade of defenses and lodges itself somewhere deep within my soul, though immediately I cannot tell where. Again I fumble to give him an answer. I give a half hearted answer about some fear I am dealing with. Somewhere within me is the hope that this answer will appease him. Maybe he will stop asking more questions. He seems to gaze through the road ahead, and then, . . stops asking.
We travel to Livingston and he conducts his business at the saddle store we came there for. I enjoy spending time with Tony. Here is a man that I respect, who for whatever reason, has allowed me to have a place in his life and in the lives of his family. You know that place, where people become not just friends, not just people you know, but rather they become an extension of your family? That’s Tony and Tammy. I have known them for the better part of my Christian life. We met one day as I was invited by another friend to ride horses after church. This skinny but intense cowboy walks up to me and hands me the reins of a horse he says is quote, "dog gentle." The rest, is history. I began working for him years later, would take part in the jail ministry he preached in every Friday night, would live in a tent on his ranch for four months in the winter of Florida, and through him, I would discover a church that more than any other I have ever visited before, or since, felt more like home to me than my own house.
I moved to Tennessee six months ago after the passing of my mother from COPD. The last four years however seem a blur. Isolation, resignation, and a hollowed surrender to life kept me from truly living. But then, sometimes God gives us the very thing that we think we want. After I moved to Tennessee, I came out of that depression and called my friend Tony one day. We spoke for an hour or two, and over the next few months, we spoke many more times and that fellowship, which I abandoned long ago, was once again restored. Then about a months ago while I was talking to Tony, he invited me to visit him and his family in Montana. And that they would cover the cost of travel for me. So, 2 weeks later, I am riding on a greyhound bus to visit friends that I had missed terribly over the last 6 years. And then the most wonderful thing started happening during the wait to travel to Montana. God started moving in ways I could visibly see. At first it was that still small voice that simply said, "there is more to your trip to Montana than you think there is." Then it branched from there to, "You know Tony doesn’t just make invitations like this (especially coming out of the ministries’ finances) without a reason, he is going to ask you something important." Then just to add more suspense, God dropped the atomic bomb of all thoughts. "What do you think about moving to Montana?" And all this was even before I got on the greyhound bus to travel here!
Tony seems not to push the questions today. And I am grateful. I didn’t know how to answer it. I didn’t have an answer for it. But as we get back to his house later in the afternoon, after the horses are cared for, Tony asks me to come into the dining room. When I get there I sit down and both he and Tammy sit down also. These are the times of confrontation and spiritual surgery I have come to refer to as the "round table moments."
It is a dangerous place to allow someone into your life that knows more about you than you do. But then, I think that is why I restored fellowship with Tony. Both he and Tammy seem to have the direct line to God concerning all things related to me, and this is both a huge comfort, and an immense concern to me. But today was different. Today Tony simply said, "I am not sure you are ready for this." By ‘this’ he is referring to the thing God is leading me to. And that is moving to Montana to be accountable, and radically discipled by both Tony and Tammy. Immediately I begin to feel desperation within me. For as much as I am terrified of what this season of my life will look like, I am more scared of passing it up or somehow causing them to change their mind concerning their invitation. What do you mean I am not ready, I think to myself. Didn’t God direct this thing? Isn’t God the one that brought me up here to begin with?
"I asked you this morning what God was showing you, and you gave a vague answer to a very specific question. Then I asked you what Rob was seeing about Rob, and you couldn’t answer that." Something inside of me broke. I can feel the emotions start to surface. Tony continues with his train of thought. He speaks of freedom, he speaks of fasting, and as he is talking, something is churning inside my spirit. Something I have never let out before. Something up until that point, I didn’t think I had to expose. That thing was me.
For as long as I had known Tony, both he and Tammy always seemed to know what was going on inside me before I did. They knew things about me that I didn’t know myself. Such knowledge could only come from God. And because of that, I allowed their insight to dictate the conversations, I never had to share it or vocalize it myself. And that is what God was bringing to the surface today.
And before I knew it, my tears are falling in front of both of them. I am trying to form sentences but even such a things as simply words seem difficult for me now. As I attempt to share with them such things from the deepest darkest recesses of my soul, I become more and more emotional, more tears come, more crying, more difficulty forming sentences. Then the truth hits me. Tony asks a question, "Rob, I want you to think about this. Are you afraid of freedom?" The question hits me like a freight train, but inside before I even have a chance to process it, my spirit demands to be heard, and I say without hesitation, "yes."
The truth is, I have never had to be vulnerable around another. The truth is, I have always been a ‘go with the flow’ type of guy. The truth is, I have never allowed anything to affect me in major ways. Not the death of my mother, not moving to an unknown state (Tennessee), not losing jobs, losing homes, nothing. Nothing truly affects me. Not in a major way at least. I have insulated myself. I have erected massive walls around myself to keep anything that is risky at bay. Things have always been done in my time, in my way, and thus, I have always been able to rest in the knowledge that if I failed, it was because of my choices and I could endure that. I attempted to build the ministry God has for me, not because I thought I could do a better job than Him, but rather because if I controlled it, then I controlled how badly I got hurt if it went south.
Galatians 5:1 says, "It was for freedom that Christ set us free." That freedom means we have the freedom to be vulnerable around another person. What was God showing me today? He was showing me that I cannot simply be passive through this process of discipleship and rely completely on Tony and Tammy to do it all for me. I have to share, and desire that change within me. And make no mistake about it, this is radical discipleship. Jesus spent 3 years pouring into the lives of His disciples. I am committing myself to the entirety of this course. And this has the potential to kill me. Do you have any idea how hard it was to open up and bear my soul in front of Tony and Tammy? And these are people I know, people I trust, people I know that if push came to shove would bleed and die in order to protect me. But even with them, I felt intense battle going on inside me over whether or not to confide my deepest darkest secrets I didn’t even want to look at myself…..
And this marked the beginning of my discipleship. And this is the journey I now invite you the reader to take with me as I walk down this path, and confront the things that hold me back from the absolute fullness of what it is that God has called me to.
No comments:
Post a Comment