OnFire #70 Faith Means Stepping in Fear

"I can't do it," I said to David Voye, our high school music teacher.

I was 14, in grade ten, and I had just told him I wasn't going coming back to stage band. I had been to one practice and it scared the daylights out of me. The first piece of music had notes in it I didn't even know were possible to play on the trumpet. It was too hard and I didn't want to go back.

Mr. Voye was persistent. "Come back. You'll have an easier part. You'll learn. Just try."

I wasn't convinced. "I can't do it."

"At least give it one more shot."

I did, and though it wasn't easy, I stayed. As it turned out, that piece of music was the hardest we played during my time in the band. We worked so hard on it that, 20 plus years later, I can still play it from memory. I was afraid to try, but Mr. Voye asked me to trust him that it would work out and it did. I continued to play trumpet and developed my skills, learning not only trumpet, but also perseverance and confidence.

At times I think about the actions and decisions that changed the course of my life, and that conversation outside the music room at Three Oaks Senior High was one of them. Had I left, would I have stayed on the course to play more music, which has become so important to me now?

Stepping in fear is the OnFire topic this week. We've been looking at different aspects of day-to-day faith and so far we've seen that 1) we can't go with God and stay where we are and that 2) faith means better days ahead. This week we look at moving ahead, even though we are afraid.

The first group of exiles to return to Jerusalem after the Babylonian captivity was sent to rebuild the temple. We might like to think that all they had to do was to arrive and start building, but it was not that easy. The biblical book of Ezra chronicles the struggles they faced to start over. In addition to the task of putting up a new house of worship, they faced enemies among the people who now inhabited the area.

Highlighting the importance of worship, the priests began by building an altar. We read, "Despite their fear of the peoples around them, they built the altar on its foundation and sacrificed burnt offerings on it to the LORD, both the morning and evening sacrifices." (Ezra 3:3*)

"Despite their fear..." I love that word "despite." They were afraid, but they did it anyway. They built the altar even though their instincts said it wasn't safe or wise and they presented sacrifices to God. They not only did it not only once, but they continued afterward.

This is faith in action. They were afraid but they did it anyway because they knew it was the right thing and they knew it was pleasing to God. These small steps were necessary if they were to rebuild the temple. While the steps felt big at the time, the people would need even more courage to lay the foundation and build the walls in the face of opposition.

There are lots of times we become afraid to go into the future - to do the right thing, to stand up for what we believe in, or to follow what we believe is God's vision. We wonder how people will react. We fear what the costs or consequences will be, or that God's direction might take us away from something we want.

At this point we have to come back to Ezra 3:3. "Despite their fear..."

There was one summer when I was a college student that my job finished and I needed two more weeks of work to go back to school. I prayed that God would provide and then I littered the town with posters for odd jobs. I accepted a job to paint a house, only to realize later that the yard sloped away, making a simple bungalow into a two-and-a-half storey house. I hate ladders and literally prayed, "Lord, you gave me the job, now you'll have to get me up the ladder." That was one instance when I trusted God despite my fear.

There have been situations in churches where I was afraid to lead because I didn't know how people would react. What if they thought my idea was stupid? What if it they didn't want to follow? What if they weren't really behind it and it becomes an excuse later to fire me? The words "despite their fear" are a challenge to trust God and take my eyes off people and circumstances.

Going with God means leaving our present circumstances behind for the promise of a better future, but this does not come without fear. We sense the risk but we go ahead, with God, despite our fear. That's faith.