Meeting God Beyond Comfort Zone

 

‘Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you’ -Genesis 12:1

In Genesis 12, we read about Abram’s calling (later Abraham). At this point, God tells Abram to leave his home country, a place where He’s well familiar with, to leave his people and most importantly, his father’s household and journey to a place that is totally new to him. God then goes ahead and tells Abram the good things and promises that He had in mind for him, but first, Abram had to leave his father’s household to receive the promises of God.

God has amazing plans for each one of us; plans to prosper us, plans to bless us and plans for a better future. Like Abram, God intends to do amazing things in our lives, but first, we must show readiness to leave what is familiar to us and to meet God and His promises outside our comfort zone. For as long as an arrow stays in the quiver, it will never achieve its full purpose. Similarly, if we limit ourselves only to our comfort zones, we will never fully discover our potential and the amazing promises that God has in store for us.

To leave our comfort zone, it require trust. The Hebrew word for trust is ‘Batah’, which means to feel confident, safe and secure. In verse 4, we read that ‘So Abram went, as the LORD had told him.’ Abram left his father’s household because he chose to place his confidence in God's promises; he felt secure and safe in God’s word. He trusted God even when it didn’t make sense to leave what was familiar to him and journey to a place that God had not yet disclosed to him.

Do you feel like God is calling you out of your comfort zone? What seems to be holding you back? Is it fear of leaving your familiarity, or is it fear of facing the unknown? God wouldn’t be calling you out of your comfort zone if He didn’t have something good on the other side waiting for you. As God called Abram to leave his father’s household, He made sure to let him know what He had in mind for him. God told Abraham that He would make him into a great nation, that he would be blessed, and make his name great.

God’s calling in our lives is an invitation to make a new covenant with God. To make a solid covenant with God, it must be done from a place of trust, and outside what we are familiar with, so that we can develop continuous reliance and dependence on God. Meeting God outside our comfort zone may seem insecure and exposed, but really, it is the most secure place we could ever be because we are in His presence.

David writes in Psalm 23, ‘The LORD is my shepherd’, taking the humble position of a sheep that obediently follows the Shepherd wherever He takes it. This is possible because the relationship between the Shepherd and the sheep is built on trust. Trust is saying, ‘I don’t know where you are taking me, LORD, but I will follow you’ or ‘LORD, I don’t understand what you are up to, but I trust in your plans for me, which are always good’ or ‘LORD, the path you are taking me through is uncomfortable and hard but I trust it is for my good.’

Meeting God outside our comfort zones would very often involve going through the most difficult and challenging seasons. As David writes in Psalm 23:4, ‘Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff they comfort me.’ The best thing about meeting God outside our comfort zone is that His presence never leaves us. His presence is ever-present in our lives, even in the darkest and most difficult seasons of our lives.

The best thing about meeting God outside our comfort zone is that, even after going through the darkest valley – dark and trying times- He goes ahead and shows His goodness to us by preparing a table before our enemies and anointing our head with oil. Psalm 23:5, ‘You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows.’

God is a rewarder. Like He rewarded Abraham for trusting Him, He rewards those who choose to be obedient to His call, those who are willing and ready to go outside their comfort zone to fulfil God’s divine purpose, and those who go one step further in demonstrating their trust in God’s word.

In Matthew 6:33, Jesus points out a better way of meeting God beyond our worries, beyond our anxieties and beyond our fears, and that is to ‘Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness.’ By constantly focusing on what we shall eat, what we shall drink or wear limits us to our comfort zone. God wants us to move beyond these things that have somehow prevented us from experiencing His goodness and provision. When we answer His call by trusting His word and going beyond our safe zone, He promises to take care of all our needs. He says, ‘And all these things will be given to you as well.’

God always has a better plan. One part of His grand plan is a calling, and the other part is His promise. In between, there’s trust and obedience that He requires us to demonstrate in our walk with Him. To receive the blessings of God, we have to be bold enough and step outside our comfort zone by doing what God requires us to do as we fix our eyes on Him. The question is, 'Do you trust God and His plans for you?'