It’s Worth The Risk!

This post is written to link with Five Minute Friday: write for five minutes on a one-word prompt.  The prompt today is “risk.”  Also linking with Grace & Truth

I’d never have thought of myself as a risk-taker.  I’ve always been cautious by nature – planning carefully, considering the possible outcomes, too often erring on the side of playing it safe.

But something has changed…

As I reflected a couple of weeks ago, I’m starting to live “the life I never led.”

If I was to sum up the past month, “risk” would be a good word.

It’s a risk to stand up and share your story and your heart, not knowing how it is going to be received.

It’s a risk to enter into someone else’s pain, to hear of horror beyond anything you can imagine, and to stay and to listen, knowing there’s nothing you can do, but somehow trusting that God has brought you together for this purpose and he can bring healing.

It’s a risk to publicly start out on a particular path with no idea where that path will lead or whether anyone will join you on the journey.

It’s a risk to share the truth with friends, to let yourself be known as you are, and to hope their response is good.

And the risk is not without cost.  There has been anxiety, and sleepless nights, and days when exhaustion has hit…

But it has been absolutely worth it.

This month has been a lesson in seeing what God can do when you take the risk (the risk that he is calling you to.)

It has given me the opportunity to help someone in need, and, despite my feelings of inadequacy, it’s obvious that the way our paths have crossed can only have been God.

It has allowed me to experience a miracle of God’s timing and people’s stories intersecting that blows my mind.  And I know this is only the start and the potential for the future is huge! (And I wish I could tell you more, and one day hopefully I will!)

It has deepened friendships, grown community, and planted seeds for future conversations, and I’m glad I took the risk…

…Because the greater risk would have been to do nothing, to settle, to hold back.

The greater risk would have been to miss out on joining in with what God wants to do.