I shared this as a devotional during a class in Adventure Leadership and Outdoor Ministries at Liberty last Thursday. Thought I’d share here:
Escape
I find myself living for the weekends and for breaks. Over the last three years here at LU, spring break has been the highlight of the spring semester. If we follow our predetermined career choices and the path of least resistance, I think one day we’ll look back and long for the glory days of college. For friends of mine these memories will be filled with caribbean beaches, random hookups, binge drinking and morning hangovers. My breaks tend to revolve around rugged mountain tops, long runs, dirty thru hikers and Oreos.
Our breaks are what we live for. They justify a little credit card debt. This was the mountain top experience of the spring semester, the epicenter of our social ives, the seven days where we spent seven weeks of income- this was spring break.
We viewed these sacred days as an escape from the ordinary. The mundane existence of the rest of our college carer would be forgotten for seven days. We would actually work ahead for once so we could completely forget about the tasks our professors assigned so inconsiderately. We can’t wait to jump the fence, pack up our cars and go.
What if things were different? What if there was no fence? What if life didn’t resemble a prison? What if there was no need to escape?
“Escaping from the ordinary” assumes that the ordinary we are fleeing from is somehow less then ideal. When we live for vacations, we treat everyday life as an unfortunate but necessary phase in our existence, a sort of valley leading to the summit.
What if escape wasn’t necessary?
Escape has always been a romantic idea because it stands for progress, it symbolizes hope, and it stirs a deep passion in our souls for new beginnings. To be honest, it’s rooted in fear. We’re afraid we’ll never enjoy life if we don’t get out and “live a little.”
The fear drives us to reserve the extraordinary to one week of the year, which means we spend 98% of life wishing, wanting and waiting- living in the ordinary.
A wise man once said, “There is no fear in love,” and “for perfect love casts out all fear” (1 John 4:18). What if the same energy that fueled you during spring break powered your lives everyday? What would your careers look like? families? faith?
In a world dissatisfied with 98% of life, dare to embrace the whole thing. Dare to live life like a giant road trip. Dare to have so much fun you forget the meaning of “vacation.”
If escape wasn’t necessary, how would you live?
