You have stayed here long enough...get moving.

(A pic from my hike up to 7K ft elevation in the Mission Mtns of Montana)

Recently i have been studying Deuteronomy with 2 great friends who also happen to be 2 great teammates, Derrick Purvis & Chris Hahn. In the first chapter we read a passage where God speaks to Moses and says: "You've stayed long enough at this mountain. On your way now. Get moving." After telling him where to go God goes on to say: "I've given you this land. Now go in and take it."

That passage really jumped out to me and caused me to ask myself a couple of very important and challenging questions.

1) Will i be able to discern when i need to move on to another mountain? And for me i don't mean the "mountain" necessarily has to be a physical move of location -- it could just be a new challenge in my life or something new i need to be working on.

2) Will i have the courage and confidence to move to the next mountain? So often it is much easier to just stay in places of comfort. Admittedly, i am right now in a place of comfort. Now believe me i have challenges in my job and in my life -- but overall i feel pretty comfortable. But were a change asked or required of me how would i approach it?

This story of Moses and all of Israel moving from place to place in the desert for 40 some years and NOT entering into the "promised land" that God had given them makes it very easy to critique them and even laugh at how silly they were. I mean seriously, if you read about their exploits and the foolish things they did and said it can be comical. They would be literally and metaphorically on the mountaintop one day and down in the valley (again physically & metaphorically) the next.

But if i stop for only a moment and examine my own life i find that i am just like them. However, i am using these 2 questions that came quickly to me to alter that habitual behavior. God often gives us an invitation -- but its also usually followed closely behind with a challenge. We love the invitation but we often don't embrace the challenge.

So as i challenge myself to be open to not just the invitation but also the challenge -- i lay the same dare out to you.