The first words are always difficult, at least they are for me anyway. How do I begin? What words, what topic, will hit the juncture of where people are and what they need? How am I to do it week after week? Well, now you know where my head and heart are right now as we start out together. To be honest, I have wrestled with a good bit of fear as I have dreamed and prayed about a weekly blog discussing groups and spiritual formation. What could I possibly say that would be meaningful? Who am I to speak to issues that even I don’t always understand? How could God use me? Fear and its companion Doubt  have dogged my thoughts as the day for launching this blog has drawn near. Following on the heels of this dynamic duo have been Dread and Insecurity, a tag team that always seems to hang around long after their welcome has expired.  Yet, here I am and I am writing. I suppose in one sense I am writing because it is part of who I am. I write. However, I don’t often share what I write. It is for me and God. I am perfectly content to put my thoughts on paper for God’s and my eyes only, something as an offering to Him.

That said, why am I writing and putting it out there for others? I suppose you could say it really wasn’t my idea. It has something to do with a calling. In the midst of the fear, there has been this sense of purpose that seems to keep burning. Flickering. Buffeted by Trepidation and company. Yet, still flickering. You might call it a Divine ember, a small glowing light that seems to beckon, a gentle light that seems to say that God wishes to speak, that He has something to say to us. It is that small irrepressible ember that has put these words out there. So I sit, hunched before a screen bathed in a blue-green  Microsoft luminescence writing, offering to God what I can, hoping and praying that He will take what it is and use it to His glory.

I wonder if maybe you have ever done the same. No, I am not talking about writing. I am talking about pushing forward, giving something that is part of yourself to God, not because it is great in your eyes but because God has asked for it, placed upon you a calling. You step out and open your hands to offer your gift not knowing what will happen to it. Maybe it was leading a group for you or talking to a neighbor about Christ. Maybe it was simply loving on your kids or trying your hand at something new. Whatever it was, it was probably scary and freeing all at the same time.  What is it that God wants to do? What can He do? I don’t know. Maybe you don’t either. Neither of us will ever find out if we don’t answer His calling.

But God chose the foolish things of the world. . .God chose the weak things of the world. . .so that no one may boast before Him. (1 Corinthians 1.27-29)

A fellow traveler,

Blake