One Eight Eleven.

World, I give you myself. Really? Yes. Maybe. No. Well... maybe. I give you myself, World.
Or, does God give you myself?

I've been contemplating the Lukan call to discipleship. Sell your possessions, leave your family, pull up your roots. Follow me. What does it mean to follow Christ? Especially when Christ-following manifests itself so differently in individuals and communities. Is it possible to follow Christ more closely or from further away? And are they both Christ-followers if one is only sort-of committed to following. What about the ones who give up everything? Sell their possessions. Leave their families. Pull up their roots.

Such temptation we have to say that my Christ following is better than yours. Or, because I "get" my Christ following that I have it down more perfectly than you. What if our Christ following is a big string of mess ups and wrong turns. It seems to me that the One who ate with sinners and broke himself for the world might be okay if his followers are wandering, broken, sinners. The kind of people who don't have down his instructions for discipleship perfectly. The ones who have no clue what they are doing but chose to wake up in the morning. The ones who keep moving.

The ones who are willing to face and live out of their fear for the future. When Christ calls he doesn't lay it all out and say, this is how you will be and this is how it will go for you. He paints a simple picture: Follow me. Life. Wholeness. Healing. For the world.

None of that has to do with a perfect career, the ownership of a home or a car, the amount of children you have, living into what is "destined." If you look closely it has to do with faith and fear. Having the faith that God will provide for you life in the midst of fear, in the midst of need, in the midst of confusion.

Don't figure it all out. Please continue to mess up. Even say out loud that you don't have it figured out and that you are messing up. Because God is using us broken misfits, he's giving you-the imperfect ones-to the world, for the sake of the world. That's the only way the rest of the broken, hurting, vulnerable ones will know that in Christ, we the broken, hurting, vulnerable ones have worth and meaning, can be used as agents for the world, can still proclaim Christ in spite of it all.

God is giving you to the world. Are you giving yourself, too?