by Mo Isom
With every bold and courageous yes, I found my life adventure growing. A faith based around saying yes to God opened the most amazing doors. In the course of just a year or two it lead me to so many incredible places. I found my way to the summit of Mt. Kilimanjaro, sharing the gospel and washing the feet of weary porters along the way. To the slums of Uganda, holding and loving on children and adults dealing with disease, whom society had turned its back to. To the streets of Costa Rica, praying over young prostitutes and helping move mountains with growing ministries needing farming space. And to the prisons of Baton Rouge, encouraging and speaking life to incarcerated dads reunited with their children for a day. All in Jesus Christ’s name.
I found myself speaking all across the nation—sharing my testimony, unpacking the gospel, and proclaiming the Good News. As incredible as the highs were, the yeses also lead me to the smallest places. And when my pride began to creep in and my ego started to trip me up and convince me those smaller venues were less significant, the Spirit spoke truth through a friend who helped me reframe my perspective again.
Embracing Your Mission Field
Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving. (Col. 3:23–24)
Too often we allow the enemy to convince us we are in a job or a circumstance or a family or a school where we are ineffective to be used as God’s own tool. We feel like we’re stuck or we’re wasting our time or we’re in an environment where we can’t really use our gifts and talents for God. But the fact of the matter is that this perspective is a lie we have to actively combat and eventually break through. God is a King of purposeful sovereignty, and He is always in the business of using you.
It takes creativity, at times, to see life through a King-view and embrace how He is possibly using us in the places we are. It’s easy to covet the position others are in. To become jealous of how someone else is being used. But, in truth, God has a perfect purpose for the day, the hour, and the specific place He has you. He desires to use your specific skills and talents and strengths in the exact setting you’re in, for whatever season of time He intends. It’s trusting in that truth that broadens our narrow perspectives and allows our attention to shift to the mission field He’s already led us to.
Would you consider yourself a missionary? It’s a title that, for a long time, I only saw through a thin and tilted view. I thought missionaries were only those believers off in foreign countries, evangelizing in the slums or remote bush villages of unreached nations or planting churches across the world and relying solely on support-raising. I thought the role of a missionary was exclusive and unobtainable. A coveted calling that God put on the hearts of only the boldest believers—the ones willing to radically give everything up in order to follow Him.
But then one day someone asked me what I did for a living. I always cringed at that question because my answer was never as clean and packaged as a nine-to-five job. I always fumbled for words and awkwardly tried to explain that I traveled place to place sharing my story, and that I blogged and wrote in faith that God would use my broken words to impact somebody. I didn’t know how to explain that I just blindly trusted, each day, that God was using me, but before I could finish my tangled words this time, he said, “Oh, you’re a missionary.” I stared at him for a moment and clarified that none of the places I was traveling were exotic or unreached. Primarily they were mundane—churches, community gatherings, events, and various retreats.
“Right, so you’re a missionary,” he repeated. “I’m a missionary too. I teach at my town’s public high school and help coach a football team for the youth.”
I must have looked ridiculously confused, because he went on to explain to me that since we were both believers we were inevitably focused on loving others well, being about God’s business, and sharing His truth. That we may be in more “average” places, but that that type of Kingdom work was exactly what missionaries did. He challenged me to see every place I spent time in as a new mission field. He reminded me that, in Christ, I looked different. That wherever I was and whatever I was doing, people were watching me. If I lived my life understanding that I was a missionary, would I not live with more awareness and more intention? “Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through Him to God the Father” (Col. 3:17 NASB).
I heard an awesome quote one time that simply said, “Wherever you are, be all there.” I think it’s important we understand that God knows exactly how He is using us and what plans He has for our lives. It is up to us to embrace the purpose He has for us, work diligently to be about His business, hold our plans loosely, be ready to surrender ourselves to Christ, and say yes to God when He prompts us to move—fully trusting that His plans are holy and good.
12
The Bold Life
As far as I felt I had come, God still had a lot of heart-work to do in me. When it came to loving others as boldly as Christ loved me, I had a lot to learn. And to be honest, I still do. So much of my spiritual journey revolved around myself. My brokenness, my lack of understanding, my revelation, my healing, my new journey. But while the gospel encounters us personally in order to set us free, it never stops with us. Ever. It always grows to reach other people’s needs. That is what marks the difference between a journey from broken to beautiful and a journey from broken to bold—the fact that for whatever reason God chooses to include us in the continued story. He chooses to use us, boldly, to breathe out the same life that was first breathed into us.
The Great Commission makes that clear in Matthew 28:18–20.
Then Jesus came to [the disciples] and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
Trying to figure out all the ways I could be reaching others more intentionally was intimidating. I yearned for my newfound boldness to also include boldness in sharing Christ more personally with other people. I began to understand that it wasn’t too hard to act like Christ. What was challenging was to react like Christ, particularly in the moments when life was challenging and more was required of me. The nature of our hearts shine through in these moments of response and reaction, and it was in those times others would be able to see Christ in me most clearly. So rather than praying God would just download truth into me, I began praying for opportunity. I found that the situations He placed me in and the circumstances He began to bring me through almost always fit into one or more of three callings: to love deeply, to forgive freely, and to march boldly with a holy army.
Love Deeply
A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know you are my disciples, if you love one another. (John 13:34–35)
A spiritual mentor of mine once taught me that a woman should never pursue a man. A woman should pursue a deeper, more intimate relationship with Christ, and, in turn, the man God would eventually inspire to pursue her would be drawn nearer to Him as he peeled back the layers of who she was, in Christ.
When it came to Jeremiah Lee Aiken, I semi-listened to that advice. My “Kissless Till Next Christmas,” year-long intimacy fast was rapidly approaching its second birthday, and I had loved my season of singleness in Christ. But when I was first introduced to Jeremiah, I could have stared at him all night. In fact, I think I did. He was the most attractive man I’d ever seen. His presence was captivating. It didn’t hurt that he loved Jesus fiercely. And that he had an air of gentleness and humility about him that was intoxicating. I won’t go so far as to say that I threw myself at him, but when he first asked for my number it took me about four seconds to decide that I loved Jesus and Jesus loved
me, but I was ready to be dating. Immediately.
After nine months of dating, I knew in my heart that Jeremiah was the man I longed to marry. After fifteen months of dating, I was prepared, at any moment, for him to take a knee. In fact, I was egging it on. Let’s be honest: I had already picked out the ring. I expected the proposal to come, but I never would have expected that once Jeremiah did take that knee, God would begin teaching me some of the greatest lessons about what it truly meant, biblically, to love another deeply.
My whole life I’d been sold “happily ever after,” time and time again. In the movies. On TV. On Facebook, Pinterest, YouTube, you name it. I’d heard talk about “Prince Charming,” “the One,” my “soul mate.” Even in church, I’d been told that God was designing the perfect man for me. That there was one out there who would complete me. While I’d always rolled my eyes at those concepts, particularly after all I’d learned through my spiritual fasting, I had still failed to realize how much they had subtly etched their way into my thoughts and heart.
I’d loved seeing my relationship with Jeremiah unfold. We’d navigated the highs and lows of dating. We’d stumbled and struggled. We’d shared great victories and highs. We’d cried some, laughed often, bickered more, and smiled the most. We’d supported one another in the struggles of building our careers. We’d seen financial blessings and we’d been broke-as-a-joke. We’d been faithfully committed to one another and held one another accountable to purity. We’d wrestled conviction and repented openly to one another. We’d praised and worshiped together, we’d struggled and sinned together, we’d crawled back to the foot of the cross together. We’d fallen in love with one another’s families, we’d wasted days away dreaming of our own future family. We’d worked out together, vegged out together, and rocked out together. We’d worked through book studies with one another, traveled with one another, been beyond annoyed with one another. We’d comforted one another, danced with one another, and respected one another. We’d navigated through the year and ultimately, every day, chosen to grow in love with each other.
Yet when Jeremiah asked me to be his wife on one chilly February night, I immediately doubted my answer.
I knew I couldn’t have been the only girl in the world who cried tears of joy with a new ring on her finger while wrestling the overwhelming weight of the yes that just escaped her lips. I knew I couldn’t have been the only girl whose mind had begun spinning when the hypothetical dreams became the reality of the moment. I knew I couldn’t have been the only girl who wondered why her “fairytale” moment wasn’t as ridiculously blissful and simple as the four hundred thousand movies had made it seem. I knew I couldn’t have been the only girl who had ever felt guilty for even harboring that range of emotion. But the fact of the matter was that as soon as the boyfriend I cherished became the fiancé I promise to cherish for the rest of my life, my human nature began to doubt. And I began to realize how much, in regard to love, my mind and heart had been crafted by the world rather than the Word.
You see, the world says there is a soul mate. The world says there is a Prince Charming. The world says there is a perfect person for you out there, and if you find them you will live happily ever after. If you do marry the wrong one, it’s not the end of the world; you can just divorce them and continue the hunt for the one made just for you. The one who will always make you happy. But if you want the least amount of hassle possible, make sure you find the perfect one the first time around.
The world says the person should be perfect for you. The ring should be perfect for you. The proposal should be perfect for you. The wedding should be perfect for you. And the Pinterest world will certainly praise you. If you manage to host the perfect barn wedding, that is.
But the Word says it has nothing to do with you. The Word says the covenant of marriage has everything to do with God. The Word says the journey of navigating a lifetime promise of abiding love has everything to do with Jesus. And the only thing perfect for you in the equation is grace.
My mind doubted because I was weighed down with the fear of making the wrong choice. Maybe Jeremiah wasn’t “the One.” How would I know for sure? There were things we disagreed on. There were things about him that didn’t always make me happy. It had been a challenge, at times, to love him. I knew it had also been a challenge, at times, for him to love me. Maybe we were just compatible and I was making the wrong decision. How would I know, for sure, that he was my soul mate?
But in my doubt and my prayer and my questioning, I quickly realized that maybe, just maybe, I had it all backwards. God revealed to me that marriage was a covenant—a promise—to God that we would vow to love another like Christ first loved us. In the most intimate, challenging, all-inclusive way. With a deep, abiding love that mirrored His unfailing grace. It was a vow to become one flesh with another person. To serve them and selflessly love them as Christ served and selflessly loved us to the cross. To carry their burdens. To take the lashes of their shortcomings. To bear the taunting of their sins and struggles. I was to put Jeremiah before myself, to the point of brokenness, so that we could ultimately rise, just as our King did, in love. With a greater understanding of the magnitude of the gospel. With a greater appreciation for the power of what Jesus did on our behalf.
God revealed to me that marriage was a taste—a tiny, intimate taste of His love for us. A promise that was not measured lightly because, ultimately, it was a promise to accept another and love another like God loved us. It was nothing I could even come close to doing on my own. And that became the joy of saying yes to the proposal. Not that I had found my “perfect” person, but that he and I were a step closer to drawing back a layer and getting to see God’s perfect love played out in a beautiful way in our lives.
I became excited about marrying Jeremiah because he was not the perfect man for me. And I was not the perfect woman for him. But we were both committed to following the perfect King who showed us the perfect example of how to truly love, deeply.
I was overwhelmed that God would allow me—messy, baggage-carrying, selfish, emotional me—to have the honor and privilege of loving and caring for His sweet child Jeremiah. I knew the minute I believed I was capable of selflessly and unconditionally loving him, I would fail. But it brought the sweetest joy to my heart to know that I didn’t have to go at it alone. God was with me. God was with us. Through Him, all things were possible. Including a deep love that mirrored the love God had for me.
I began to learn that the ultimate wreckage of self was available to me through the covenant of marriage, and that the greatest challenge I would ever journey through would keep me in a state of voluntary wreckage for years to come. But that hard love, that tough and holy love, would grant me a partner to walk through life-lived discipleship with and would shape me into more of the image of Christ than everything else.
I also realized that deep love God revealed to me was applicable to so many other relationships. To every other person around me. That loving others deeply was hard, and messy, and inconvenient at times, but it was the clearest picture of God’s grace. That every single person I came into contact with was going to spend eternity in one of two places, and I needed to love like that was a big deal. By loving others deeply I was truthfully preaching the gospel—even more so than when I used words. And that deep and present and sacrificial love was the same love that would require everything of me but would ultimately set my heart free.
Forgive Freely
In order to love Jeremiah fully, and to love others fully, I knew I had a lingering piece of bondage that still needed to be broken through. I couldn’t live boldly and I couldn’t love deeply if the bondage of unforgiveness still owned me. If I wanted my life to boldly echo Christ’s life, then unforgiveness couldn’t hold a place in my story. It was the antithesis of the cross—after all, who are we to withhold forgiveness from one another when God has never withheld forgiveness from us?
Loving others deeply doesn’t just apply to those whom we have peace
with and whom it feels good to love. Living boldly and loving deeply looks like forgiving freely, no matter whom that forgiveness must be outstretched toward.
That’s a hard concept to wrap our heads around. Because, in truth, there is probably someone sitting on the forefront of your mind whom you have been so wronged by that the thought of forgiveness is nauseating. Maybe it was the abuse. Or the rape. Or the theft. Or the deceit. We can think of ten thousand reasons why the people we don’t want to forgive don’t deserve forgiveness for all they put us through. But the fact of the matter is the longer you withhold forgiveness from another, the longer they own a piece of you. And if we believe Christ has bought us, in full, at the price of His own life, then we are robbing ourselves of the freedom that grace grants us when we allow another person to mentally or emotionally or spiritually hold possession over that piece of us.
Maybe it was the infidelity. Or the gossip. Or the abandonment. Maybe it was the suicide. That was the dark chain that still wrapped itself around me.
I had healed in so many ways. It had been years since my dad’s death. But I still harbored resentment toward a man I still believed, at the core, was a coward. A man who had run from the mess he made and taken a foolish way out. A man who had left a wife and two daughters to put back the pieces of a shattered life. Deep down, I blamed so much of my wandering and my promiscuity and my struggles on my dad. Sometimes that was the easier way to process things—to dismiss them as cause-and-effect results of another person’s shortcomings.