#614. Being brave.

In a few weeks the new Stuff Christians Like website is going to launch and I'm a little terrified. And not just in that way that I'm afraid of rollercoasters but pretend I'm not and come up with a lot of reasons that we probably shouldn’t ride Space Mountain today, look at those lines. Why don't we go on Thunder Mountain at night so you can't tell that I'm closing my eyes so I don't see what's coming around the bend even though my six year old daughter is sitting next to me with her eyes open. Not in that way, I mean genuinely terrified.

And the source of my nervousness?

I'm afraid to really try.

That's a dumb sentence, and perhaps this is an illogical thing to fear given all the very real nightmares people face in their lives, but fear doesn't really follow logic and that's honestly the one in my head right now. I've got this weird belief that if I don't really try, then I can't really fail. I can always buy into the lie, “If I had tried, I probably could have done that.” But if I try, if I give it my all and my all isn’t enough, I'll be crushed. It's like never writing a book but always telling yourself you could have if you wanted to, you just didn’t have time or something came up or a million other excuses.

Paying someone to design a site, taking sponsors, admitting that I’m structuring significant chunks of my day to work on this as a ministry makes the whole thing feel "real" to me. I lose the fake security blanket of saying, "It's just some ugly site on blogspot, it's no big deal."

Have you ever felt that way? Has there ever been some hope or dream that bubbles quietly inside but you're afraid to admit it's there? It's a new career or a relationship you want to begin or some off the wall ministry that's always been in your heart? Have you ever been afraid about putting your all into something?

What did you do? How did you deal with it? What happens when we're afraid?

Those are the questions I've been asking God the last few weeks and it feels like the answer might be pretty simple:

Be as brave as a six year old.

Until a few weeks ago that idea didn't make sense. I've never associated bravery with childhood, until the night before my daughter L.E. started kindergarten. We were sitting on her bed and I was trying to sell her hard on the idea. (“It will be awesome. So many friends and recess and gym!”) And in the midst of that conversation she bit her lip and admitted, "I'm a little nervous." That's all she said and then she turned her head and refused to look at me. She was doing her best to hold it together. She didn't want to cry. She didn't want to fall apart the night before the big day.

It is a big day. She was going to change from a small three hours a day preschool at a church that she had attended for years to an 8AM-3PM day full of new people, new places and new experiences. She was going to get out of a car, walk inside a monstrous building, navigate her way through hundreds of kids that were bigger and older than her to a new classroom. And she was going to do it with limited life experience.

Think about how the age of the kid amplifies the size of the experience. When you and I change jobs, we have precedent to fall back on. We can say, "Wow, new job starts today. Fortunately I've had a few other jobs before. I have a decade of work under my belt, this won't be so bad." But for kids, there's no history to fall back on. The first day of school is a gigantic adventure of colossal proportions.

Yet, she was brave.

In that moment, I felt like God challenged my understanding of who He made me to be. I've read verses about being more childlike all my life but never thought about what they’re really saying. In Matthew 18:3 for instance, Jesus says:"I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” What does it mean to become like little children? I think it might mean that we’re supposed to be as brave as a six year old.

I think it might mean we're supposed to be as trusting as a six year old. They put their faith in God and their parents with an abandon that isn't limited to logic or reason. They just trust.

I think it might mean that we're supposed to be as creative as a six year old. Every kid comes onto the planet believing they're an artist and often adulthood slowly chips away at that belief. Maybe I need to put aside my pursuit of perfection and just color.

I think it might mean that we're supposed to be as curious as a six year old. A butterfly isn’t a bug, it's a reason to yell and scream and point and maybe even jump really, really high. Kids step out into each day as a blank canvas, waiting and watching to see what new colors God brings into their life. Kids are curious.

I could go on with this list all day and there are certainly things I wouldn't add to it. There is wisdom and maturity that comes with age. But it's interesting to me that when Jesus wanted to make an example of how we're supposed to live, he never said, "Grab that 112 year old man over there. If you want to enter the kingdom of heaven you gotta be like this dude right here." He used kids as his example. We're called to become like little children.

So today, I'm going to be as brave as a 6 year old.

How about you?