Why Me God?: Stepping Outside the Comfort Zone

By Chris Carpenter
CBN.com Producer

CBN.com - And when I was weak, unable to speak

Still I could call You by name

And I said, Elbow Healer, Superhero

Come if You can

You said, I Am

-- Nicole Nordeman
I Am, from the album "Woven and Spun"

At a recent luncheon following the death of my wifes grandmother, I sat around a table consisting of my wifes family and her grandmothers pastor, a college classmate of mine. The conversation was typical, consisting mostly of lively banter centered on remembering the dearly departed. Eventually the discussion began to wane so I politely turned to my old classmate and asked how his church was doing. He began to share with me how it was growing quickly and what a great group of people attended there. My mother-in-law who had been listening to our conversation for several minutes suddenly chimed in, "Chris, why dont you become a pastor?"

Suddenly the table fell silent. It was as if all the lights had been turned off in the room except for a single blazing spotlight that was burning directly into my eyes. I sat there dumbfounded. I didnt know what to say. Finally, after several moments of playing and replaying the question in my mind, I mumbled, "Well, the reason is really quite simple. I just cant do the "shepherding" thing. You know, helping other families with their problems, going out on visitation that sort of thing. I just dont feel comfortable doing that."

My college classmate nodded and said that even if someone is called into ministry that pastoring a church is definitely not for everyone. I nodded in hasty agreement as I painfully remembered why I was not interested in pastoring a church. For you see, as the child of a Baptist minister, I spent much of my youth trundling around from house to house "calling" on local parishioners with my parents. What should have been remembered as a joyous time of sharing the Gospel message with people in my community, I instead chose only to remember sitting in stiff, straight backed kitchen chairs for hours on end, wondering what that strange smell was emanating from the next room, and listening to various tales of health concerns and financial woe. Based on these experiences, I made up my mind quite early in life that pastoring was definitely not for me due to the "shepherding" element involved.

In my adult life I have had several opportunities to become part of visitation teams at my church that I vehemently avoided. You name it, I ran from them all. Evangelism Explosion team? Sorry, I have to work. Dedicated visitation weekends? Nope, unfortunately I need to be out of town. Going door to door to invite people to services? I would rather have a root canal. My excuses were endless until last Sunday.

As part of a new Sunday School class that my wife and I are teaching, we are responsible for scheduling class members to visit new people attending our church that fall into our age group. The intention is to encourage new attendees to get involved in our Sunday school and weekly Bible studies. No problem I thought, our class is large enough that I could just "hand off" the assignment to various class members as need be. To make a long story short, I was handed our first visitation assignment approximately five minutes into the first class.

With confidence I held the information aloft in my right hand and called for a faithful volunteer. No takers. I announced it again. Everyone was busy that night including my wife who had been invited to a basket party in our neighborhood. Not wanting to appear cowardly, I announced with quivering confidence, "No problem, I will head over there myself after work on Thursday."

I was terrified. All those painful memories of strange smells and straight chairs came wafting back into my consciousness. As the clock raced toward Thursday I kept developing new scenarios that would free me from my assignment.

Mondays thought: Maybe they wont be home.

Tuesday: Perhaps they will forget and be in the middle of dinner when I arrive. I will just say something witty, hand them a packet of church information, and make my escape for the car.

Wednesday: Hopefully, they will be rude and slam the door in my face (this is how desperate I had become).

It was now Thursday. There was no turning back. I spent most of my day trying to forget what I had to do after work. The clock finally struck 6pm. Time to go. I slowly packed up my briefcase, shut my office door, and began to shuffle slowly toward the parking lot.

Well, this is it," I thought to myself as I drove down the highway, speeding toward my date with destiny. I turned down the radios volume control and started to pray. "Lord, you know I dont like to do this. Please help me tonight to say the right things. I want to be a blessing to these people. Just work in me, work through me, and use me as your earthen vessel. I am in your hands. Use me as a tool and instrument to further glorify your name."

This is essentially the prayer I said to to God and myself over and over again as I drove the 20 miles to this appointment. It was as if I was trying to hypnotize myself with this prayer. I arrived at the apartment complex where these people lived approximately 10 minutes before our scheduled appointment. I pulled the car into a free parking space, turned the ignition off, and just sat in the darkness. During these last moments before my visit, I meditated upon the Lord and asked Him to give me the confidence and peace I needed to make a difference in their lives.

What I encountered was beyond belief. Just three days after attending a service at our church, this married couple, who had just moved to our area a few months before, had been in a life threatening car accident. The husband was still in the hospital, suffering from a broken back, two broken legs, and a broken arm. He was expected to be in the hospital for at least two more months. The wife, who had just been released from the hospital the morning of my visit, had crushed her left leg in the accident and was in a wheelchair. Compounding matters further, her five-year-old son was suffering from two black eyes. Fortunately, their three-year-old daughter and three-month-old son had not been injured in the wreck. I soon found out that they had no family in the area and had only been Christians for less than six months.

Despite this catastrophic situation I felt an incredible sense of peace and even a sense of boldness as I talked with her. I truly believe I was hand picked by God to make this visit. In fact, I feel I was better equipped than anyone to serve these people. This couple had moved here from Peoria, Illinois my aunt and uncle live in Peoria. Her husband, who is in the Navy, is assigned to the USS Enterprise my next door neighbor is a naval officer assigned to the USS Enterprise. In the course of our conversation, she mentioned that God was using this accident as a "wake up" call for she and her husband. Many years ago, I had two car accidents that served as a "wake up" call for me in my faith. Even though this situation was serious in nature, with Gods divine intervention I was able to more fully encourage her in these difficult moments.

Just think, ten minutes prior to my visit I would have done anything to avoid it. But due to the almighty power of Gods grace, I not only showed up but believe I helped them a small bit in their time of need.

Through the years, based on a few childhood experiences, I had lost sight of the importance of ministering to others on a one on one basis and having a servant based heart and attitude. Because I had experienced this as a youngster I believed I had earned the right to avoid these types of situations. Jesus Christ, of all people is the prime example of someone who had the right to be ministered to by men, but He instead came to serve and to give His life so we could be free. I had certainly lost sight of this.

In Deuteronomy 31:6,8 it says, "Be strong and of good courage, do not fear nor be afraid of them; for the Lord your God, He is the One who goes with you. He will not leave you nor forsake you. And the Lord, He is the One who goes before you. He will be with you, He will not leave you nor forsake you; do not fear nor be dismayed."

Why was I afraid to go out on visitation? Because I had left my fear unguarded, it had affected my reasoning power. It caused me to flee in the face of danger, in this case a fear of returning to an unhappy part of my childhood. Thus, I had become a prisoner to my own fear. When I could have been out sharing the good news of Gods love for us, I chose to run away from these experiences instead.

God promises His children that He will be there with us through all of life's pitfalls, weaknesses, and fears. He will never leave nor forsake us. His presence in our lives replaces fear with confidence, uncertainty with certainty, creates boldness instead of cowardice, and conflict with peace within your heart. However, the key to all of this is trust. You must trust Him unequivocally. If you dont you will never be freed from the spiritual bondage that is hindering your walk of faith. Just ask me, I know all about it.

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information from The Transformer, study Bible used in this article.