The other day I got to take a little road trip with one of my life-long friends and brother. It was the perfect day for a drive through the cornfields that stretch from Ohio into Indiana. We were headed back to the town where we both spent 4 years of our lives studying, dreaming, and let’s be real…being crazy college kids. This trip was for a different purpose. After a few years of living back in Cincinnati, my dear friend has now accepted a youth pastor job near our college town. He had lots of little details to take of before he moves officially and we combined the trip with an engagement photo session that I was doing for a lovely couple who also lived in this town. On the 2-hour drive up we inevitably talked of college memories, sang to some 90s songs, and grabbed a cup of Starbucks. After a day of signing leases and shooting pictures we reunited and hopped back in the car for the drive back to Cincinnati. It’s funny how a place can bring back such strong feelings and memories – some wonderful and some not-so-wonderful. We processed through these on the way back and the conversation turned to the plans that God has laid out for our lives for the foreseeable future.
We got to talking about how the experiences that we have coming up would allow us to completely reinvent ourselves if we so choose. For example, as a youth pastor in a church of people he has never met, he could tell them that he goes by “Pastor Ott” , instead of Elliott. Change of name. He could decide to be a vegetarian and no one would know that he had eaten meat until the day he moved. Change of habit. He could start dressing really hipster and grow a super cool mustache. Change of appearance. He could write out some “new life” resolutions like getting up for quiet time at 7am every day or working out consistently. Change of lifestyle.
As I began to think about what this idea looked like with my World Race journey, I saw some of the same sentiments. No one on my squad would realize if I said that I go by “Libby”, even though I have never been called that in my life. No one would know that I have never set up a tent before as long as I practice a kajillion times before training camp. I think I can make it look like I am a Chacos veteran if I take enough Instagram pictures of them first. On a more serious note – What about my lifestyle do I want to change? Should I gossip less? Be slower to speak and quicker to listen? Should I stop spending money on clothes I don’t need (unless the skirt is long enough for Africa)? Should I be more bold, more confident? Should I invest more time in fostering the gifts God has given me? And then it hit me.
Why wait until January to figure out who to be? I know who I am. I know that God has called this broken, sometimes materialistic, selfish, person to lay it all down and pick up only what He has given me. I know that this call is not only applicable to my time on the field, but to this moment – right now.
I will not wait to pursue looking as much like Christ and as little like me as possible.
