Orig: 12/3/02
Azariah the priest with eighty other courageous priests of the LORD followed him in. 2 Chronicles 26:17
A while back I was approached by a certain man about confronting another man on a bad habit that was affecting those under his leadership. Although this man’s habit was not personally offensive, I decided to go ahead and confront his behaviors. I met with him briefly, shared my concerns, he listened but did not change.
Within weeks the non confronting man left his position suddenly and moved on, never confronting the issue but choosing, instead, to avoid it by recruiting a scapegoat (yours truly) and ultimately quitting. My mistake was choosing to be the change agent instead of forcing the other man to confront the offensive behaviors on his own.
How often do we allow others to control our environment, conversations, friendships and lifestyles instead of being agents of change?
Many of the men I know seem to conform to their environment instead of confronting it or controlling it. Instead of struggling to avoid negative influences maybe we should lean on Jesus’ command to, “go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:19)”. Too often we, as men, try to live our faith on the defensive. To live defensively is to walk in constant fear of confrontation but to live offensively is to run courageously through the walls of faith.
Too many men live their faith trying not to lose instead of fighting to win. Remember when the first Star Wars movie came out in (I think) 1976? In one famous scene Han Solo, Luke Skywalker, Chewbacca and Princess Lea are stuck in the trash compacter with the walls closing in. In a desperate act of futility, they tried every resource available to slow the walls down, but it wasn’t until little R2D2 shut down the system that they were saved. The Christian life is not one with our hands against the walls resisting life as it seems to be closing in around us. Rather, it is like a laser gun blasting down the walls of life until they crumble under relentless courage. Like R2D2, a man must reprogram his mind to believe that God is big enough to make him an agent of change.
When Azariah stood against the sins of king Uzziah he didn’t just look for a big group of people. He looked for BIG people, which happened to be “eighty other courageous priests of the LORD.” Jesus did the same with the twelve. His small group of men that possessed large hearts changed the world. Isn’t that how it is? Men with big hearts are a small in number, and often difficult to find. The person who relentlessly trusts Christ is a man of profound courage. The man of large heart takes the offensive with his faith and refuses to wait for the walls of life to close in. The man of courage lives out loud and serves a large God.
Live large. Live courageously.
