Nontakebackable

Have you ever heard the story of Gideon? In the Bible, Judges chapter 6, God chose Gideon to be one through whom He would accomplish amazing things. God's will for Gideon became so clear to him that he was compelled to take action in response. Some of those first actions were to tear down his father's alter to Baal, destroy his father's Asherah pole, and replace them with an alter to the Lord. The people of the town were outraged, and demanded that Gideon be put to death. Nontakebackable.

As a child in elementary school, I'd hear people say, "take it back." "It" was likely to have been an unkind word. The offended party would be the one calling for the retraction. Of course, unkind words are actually non-take-back-able. As such, the injured person was not actually looking for spoken words to be unspoken, but was calling the speaker to repentance for their mean-ness. Repentance was required since the mean-ness was actually nontakebackable.

We all make nontakebackable choices. Minor, severe, negative, positive, they're choices that cannot be unchosen no matter what we think or wish after we make them. I stood on the top of a 60' zipline tower with my son one day. The line itself was something like 1000' long and sagged down into a valley far below the base of the tower on which we were standing. I'd spent the trip to the tower, and the climb to the top counseling him about choices. As we stood at the edge of the tower, strapped to the zipline, with our toes dangling over the edge that was 60' above the ground, he recognized that stepping off the edge, for better or worse, was nontakebackable. If not for sound equipment, we truly could have died. Yet, instead, we hopped off the edge and raced down the line safely. Exhilarating! We went back to the top to do it again!

God has called Erin and I to leave our "country, our people, and our family" to go to Florida and serve as career missionaries. He has called us to, as Jesus says in Matthew 9:37-38, seek and raise up "harvesters" who will work in the ripe harvest field of global youth. We have been taking steps of obedience, and we are increasingly aware of the nontakebackable-ness of some of our choices. It's both sobering and exciting. 

This week, I expect to have a conversation with my employer about transitioning my Construction Manager responsibilities to the man who will replace me. The project I'm in charge of is drawing near to completion, and quickly. Full time employment in the secular marketplace, and it's commensurate income, will soon be a thing of the past. I have, in obedience to God, walked to the edge of a nontakebackable choice. I am preparing to step off the edge. We are trusting that God has built this "zipline" and that the ride will be safe and exhilarating even though it's a bit scary. Perhaps you're willing to pray with us that we, and you, would place all our hope and trust in Jesus, then in obedience boldy choose the nontakebackable and watch our amazing God do amazing things.