Leaving Borderland

When I saw the chapter title "Leaving Borderland" by Mark Buchannan in his book "Your God is to Safe"- I knew that I wanted to use it for my blog title. Because that is how I feel at this juncture in my life. Taking students to China to teach English has been on our hearts for quite some time now. We have prayed, planned, and made all the arrangements to make it possible. The months of preparation have seemed long and drawn out. In one sense I am chomping at the bit to get there and on the other hand I am asking "now what is this really going to require of me?" I know what it's like for me to stay. The boys and I have a pretty good routine that works well for us. "What was I thinking when I agreed to travel 16 hours with a 2 and a 4 year old and to sleep in a dorm room for a month?" I am pretty comfortable at home. Borderland for me ask the question "do I stay or do I go?" Do I stay where everything is predictable and the roads are well travelled? Or do I go into places that are completely unfamiliar, uncomfortable, and that require something of me that I am unaware if I will be able to handle. The journey of our life is constantly taking us to the borderlands in one form or another. I am more so talking now about the spiritual sense of the matter. Just like the Israelites wondered in the wilderness for 40 years (their borderland) before choosing to trust God and to move into Caanan, the land God had promised them. You see going on this trip and leaving "borderland" is about physically enduring a different lifestyle than I am used to, but greater than that it's about the Lord using these unfamiliar circumstances to do major surgery on my heart. To uncover fears that have held me captive and to extract ways and patterns that lead to sickness and disease. To leave borderland means that new buttons will be pushed and that I can not comfortably manage how I will react. I am choosing to go. To stay would be to become stagnet. But if I go, there is a promise that I will be different, and there is a promise that I will be able to know God not just with my head but with my heart. This is the promise land- coming to understand the inheritance that I have in Jesus Christ with my heart. Meaning....that my life is changed, that I live differently, that fear is replaced by freedom, and that my delight in the Lord is overflowing with milk and honey.
In taking this first step....I really don't know what all this will mean. I have yet to see how many giants await me, and I have yet to see how big the fruit really is in Cannan. I can't paint the full picture of what "Leaving Borderland" will be like, until I have left it completely. Will I wish that I didn't leave, or will I be proud that I stepped out and over the line. That is still to be decided. So at the end of this little journey, I hope to write my reflections on what "Leaving Borderland" really meant for me.
Thanks for your prayers. Thanks for being a part of my journey. Thanks for encouraging me to go.