Barneyisfat

Boy that's what I call being bold.

My friend Andy is the epitome of timidity. (I like the sound of that.) He is pretty shy, but generally a good person to talk to. We were discussing church backgrounds today. He told me he was raised charismatic, but attended one of the 40+ Baptist churches in Toccoa. I asked if there were no charismatic churches here, and he told me a little story:

Andy and his roomate Ben went to the charismatic church one Sunday. Everyone was speaking in tongues at the same time - there was no interpretation of the tongues. Andy knew that this went against what the Bible said about speaking in tongues. Andy told Ben, who agreed. Ben got the attention of the congregation. Andy (on his first visit to the church!) opened up his Bible and read where it says that only one person should speak in tongues at a time and that there should be interpretation. Andy sat down.

My mom always talks about how Moses was meek ... and the amazing things he did. I realize more and more that I am not a bold person. I have a huge mouth, and have no problem getting up in front of hundreds of people and speaking or singing. However, when it comes right down to small group dynamics I am just not bold.

I don't stop the guys at lunch from making fun of my roomate of whom I love dearly. I don't participate. I just don't stop it.

I don't stop people from telling gay jokes, and often joke about it myself. We give no regard to the fact that they are an emerging people group with very little positive contact with the gospel and a whole lot of negative exposure to it.

When the youth group guys kicked a kid out of a game of cards because he was "too stupid to play" I didn't have a jazzy come back to make everything better. I told one of the guys that it wasn't nice ... but that was the extent.

I don't think I would ever stand up in an unfamiliar church (or a familiar one!) and tell them that their style of worship was unbiblical.

I'm too timid to stand up for Christ in so many situtation, but yet I know that Christ loves me anyways. Jesus makes me bold often, and sometimes I do stand up and speak up. I guess today I will just pray for boldness, and tomorrow will remember that when I have failed to be bold it was failure - and Jesus has great plans for me that include far less failure than victory.