What Are We Doing Here?
What are you doing here?
What am I doing here?
What are we doing here?
These questions are simple ones for sure, yet ones that when answered with all honesty bring great revelation.
Imagine arriving at a gathering (we have been invited to attend) with ticket in hand. We dressed for the event, selecting our most favorite outfit (the one that makes us look slimmer in our hips and has a color tone that accentuates our eyes). Yes, that’s the one, the outfit of choice. And so we mailed our RSVP, left home on that day with plenty of travel time, allowing us to drive at normal speed, enjoying the journey as we drove, avoiding most traffic stressors and congested areas. It’s truly been a great day for our journey, and we are so glad we have been invited. Truth be told, we are SUPER-EXCITED that we said, “Yes” when the invitation arrived to our home.
Life has a certain way of surprising us.
We go through life, making choices we know to be right, taking moments of reflection, seeing our lives as products of our past decisions, and truthfully, we arrive, pretty satisfied that we have reached this place in our lives. We have arrived. We are so thankful to have been invited, and we are so thankful we accepted His invitation for eternal life.
Then, one day, we wake up and suddenly discover——-we are all grown up! (You know…….with a job, a daily purpose filled with tasks that others expect us to do, past accomplishments earned, successes to remember and enjoy, and maybe even a home mortgage to pay). Truly, we have arrived——SUCCESS! Suddenly, we get scared. Will we admit it?
We will admit that sometimes success and accomplishments and goals reached and even purpose revealed IS JUST (well) SCARY!!!
What if I mess up now that I’ve arrived?
What if I fail?
What if I took a wrong turn and I’m not where I’m supposed to be?
What if this road is the wrong road?
And what about the others (you know, the “others” who may be watching my life unfold)?
What if I cause others to stumble and to fall?
What if I lead them astray?
What if? What if? What if?
What if I am mistaken and this is NOT God’s purpose for my life?
WHAT IF…?????????????????
Sometimes OUR successes and accomplishments and goals reached and even purpose revealed becomes quite SCARY, and today, we are asked to understand the WHY hidden behind this inner fear.
“What are you doing here, Elijah?” (1 Kings 19: 9).
***That was a question that came directly to the man who just defeated an enormous army of false idolaters and who just made a name for himself throughout the whole land of Israel.
***That was a question that came to Elijah after he ran away after the victory, totally running in fear, scared for his very life.
***And Maybe that’s the question for for us, those who THINK they have just arrived at the gathering looking good (all put together), wearing what fills us with confidence, and knowing there’s so much we can contribute to whatever conversations arise because we have reached a certain measure of success.
***That was a question that God asked Elijah AFTER Elijah had run away….AFTER Elijah was totally scared of how Queen Jezebel might truly do him bodily harm or take his life as she had promised.
***That was a question that came to Elijah when he found himself all alone, lodging within a dark cave forty days after he had already been so successful in the task God gave him to do.
***That was a question that stopped Elijah, in his tracks and caused him to take stock of Where he’d been, Where he was standing, and Where he was going.
***AND MAYBE That’s The Question God’s Asking Us Today.
Q—–What are we doing here?
Q—–Are we exactly where God would have us be?
Q—-Are we walking as closely with God as we should be?
Q—–Are we doing exactly the task God would have us do?
Q—-Are we running away from something, from a deep-felt task, or from someone God has given to us?
Q—-Maybe——Have we have been running (scared) for quite some time?
For everyone watching us, looking at our lives from the outside IN, they see our successes, our accolades, our accomplishments, and our direction we seem to be going. To the world, we got IT going on——LIFE by the tail, so to speak.
BUT……In the darkness of the cavern of our being, within the place where we truly lodge, within our heart……..We know the truth.
We know we are running scared.
Maybe we have been running scared for quite some time.
And we know that if we stopped to listen to God, He may just give us a different direction for our legs to go, a new place to be, a new closeness with Him to draw into, and a new purpose for our next (future) days.
And maybe that thought just scares us to death, SO WE RUN.
Quite possibility, today should become the moment we sit down with God, the day when we take a backward view of how God has sustained us for all the days of our life and for all the days of our flight, running away from where He would have us be.
Yes, that’s right.
Today, it is a perfect day to stop running, to pause, to see our past victories for exactly what they were——-
God’s victories lived through us.
God’s purposes accomplished through us.
All God’s!!!
****After a season of successful living is a strange time to run scared.
****After a season of winning one victory, followed by another, followed by another—–When we should be excited because we have arrived—–is a strange time to run scared.
*****After a season of living, when we arrive at the gathering, bringing something to every conversation, gathering together with others we know, talking with them, learning about their journeys, and enjoying life——YES,——-
*****That’s exactly when we should remember that life success does not really mean we have arrived, that we have reached the pinnacle of our spiritual journey, our spiritual growth.
*****That’s when we pause, talk to God, dig into His Word, talk with God some more, listen to Him speak, & Really Get Serious.
“What are we doing here?”
Truly a question for this first day of spring, a day AFTER the darkness of winter’s end, a first day of a season of re-birth and blossoming and newness of life.
******May we pause on this day and ask ourselves the same question God required of Elijah as he ran scared, running away from Queen Jezebel.
*****May we pause and see if we are giving God the glory for His victories He brings to our lives.
*****May we not RUN SCARED into our future days filled with fear, but may we WALK CONFIDENTLY into our next today FILLED WITH GOD’S SPIRIT GUIDING OUR NEXT STEP, OUR NEXT TASK, OUR NEXT CONVERSATION, AND OUR NEXT “WHATEVER” GOD LEADS US TO.
****MAY WE BE FILLED WITH THE COURAGE AND CONFIDENCE ONLY GOD PROVIDES.
*****May we answer God’s question with 100% truth.
“What am I doing here?” A great question for this calendar day of re-birth.
Our Answer IS So Important.