Stepping out in faith. Take a leap of faith. We’ve all heard of the phrases, but what do they really mean? It’s having no understanding or inkling of how God is going to do something, but stepping out in obedience anyway believing He will come through and do what He said He will do regardless of how it looks from our view. What a scary thing to do!

When I think of faith, I think of the Israelites. They wandered for 40 years and finally the time came to enter the Promised Land. The only problem—the Jordan River lay between them and the Promised Land and on top of that, it was spring time when the waters were at flood-level. Their minds were no doubt racing to the inconvenient timing and lack of boats to help them across. But thankfully God wasn’t limited to their understanding.

I just love what God asked the priests carrying the Ark of the Covenant to do – step into the water and stop. I’m not sure how steep the river bank was, but regardless … that’s active faith! God requires we take the steps into the unknown without knowing how it’s going to play out. Once we do, he then tells us the next step. What an adventure. What a leap of faith!

With our upcoming move cross-country nearing, we have found ourselves in that same spot – in obedience we’ve stepped into the flood-level waters and stopped. There were and still are many unknowns before us, but at the same time God only asks us to focus on what He says to do next. We’ve learned that each unknown is an opportunity to see the incredible power of God at work. That alone makes me excited to wake up each morning and see what God is going to do next!

We may not know what is up ahead, but we can find comfort in knowing that God has already gone before us and is leading the way. That’s what faith is all about.

Faith is like radar that sees through the fog.  ~Corrie Ten Boom

One day last week I saw hundreds of birds in the field across the street. Within seconds, they moved in unison like a school of fish, flying up and over to a new destination. I watched in amazement.

For days I studied the pictures I took fascinated by the synchronization. Each bird knew when to leave, at what precise moment to leave, and then took off. Being in sync meant they clearly picked up their cue from the next one. It happened so fast, it looked magical.

I thought about how life works following God. When I wait in stillness for His direction, I want to know His cue so clearly that when He says “now,” I take off in synch—not too soon and not too late. Just right on cue!

We each travel our own journey in following God, so we can’t take our cue from the person next to us. But I do believe God stirs up movements – within us, around us, and to propel us to go toward … sometimes to a new destination. We just need to join Him in what He’s doing.

Sometimes moves of God aren’t so abrupt like the hundreds of birds I saw last week. At times moves of God are a building, growing process—step by step. God works in many different ways. Whichever way He chooses, we need to strive to know—truly know—that nudge, guidance, and peace when God says, “Do this now.”

That means we have to be actively listening … watching … waiting.

It makes for a different focus each day, don’t you think?

For Christmas, we bought our Labradoodle dog a special bone … a very large bone. When we put it up next to her, it measured half the length of her. We thought she’d be in doggie heaven with that gargantuan treat. However, after nearly two weeks, she barely touched it.

My daughter suggested the size was too overwhelming, so I cut it in half. Surprisingly, our dog took the half and chewed on the rawhide until she stopped to take a nap. Who would have thought too much of a good thing would be so paralyzing.

It reminds me of the saying, “Don’t bite off more than you can chew.” How easy it is for us to do that in life.

We take on large tasks thinking it will be fantastic, only to find that we’ve overcommitted and are now overwhelmed. Or maybe we set too many expectations for ourselves that we can never live up to.

So how can we make sure we don’t get in over our heads?

*Be honest about your limits and respect them

*Learn to say yes to the most important things and willing to say no to the rest

And  … understand that bigger isn’t always better!