Unstuck

Have you ever felt kind of “stuck” in your life? Have you ever gotten to a place where you have stopped and look around and said, OK, how did I get here and how do I get myself out, or at least how do I get myself moving forward again? Whether it’s related to a job, or a relationship, or just a larger sense of purpose or calling in life, my guess is that many of us have been in those places where we have felt stuck. Maybe you are in that place today. I have been stuck a few times in my life. Going through college I felt God wanted me to be involved in ministry by working in television, so after graduation I ended up in Los Angeles with the goal of finding a job in the TV industry. The problem was I didn’t have a very good plan for going about this; I literally just kind of ended up in the city after a cross country trip. I had no car to get around the city. I had no contacts to help me find a job or even a plan on where to start looking. All I had was a degree in TC from MSU, but without even a day’s worth of experience in an actual TV station or production studio, that degree was not going to even open a door for me. I was stuck. Stuck in LA, stuck trying to figure out what to do with my life, stuck trying to figure out what God wanted me to do, stuck just knowing what to do the next day.

Sometimes we feel stuck when we are looking for jobs, but we can also feel stuck in a job. I’ve been stuck in a few jobs where I have had to wrestle with the question, OK God, is this really what you want from me? Is this what I need to be doing with my life? And if not, how do I get unstuck? How do I start moving forward?

We not only get stuck in and out of our jobs and in and out of relationships, but we can also get stuck in our faith. For me those moments have come when I suddenly realize that when it comes to God, I’m just going through the motions. I might be faithfully attending worship and bible studies, but I’m missing out on the larger joy and passion that should come when we are walking in a relationship with God.

Getting stuck in their faith is where Israel was as a nation when John the Baptist arrived on the scene. If we go back to Luke 3:1-3 we see exactly where Israel was when John began his ministry.

All these names do two things for us; first they give us a clear indication of the time when John, and therefore Jesus, began their ministry. If we piece together all the rulers and the times when they ruled, we will discover that John and Jesus began their ministry about 27 AD. So Luke helps us pinpoint the date when all these things took place, but this historical overview also helps us see what life and faith for Israel would have been like at that time. The names of Emperor Tiberius and Pontius Pilate and Herod and Philip and Lysanias make it clear to us that Israel is dominated by Roman rule and authority. With Herod, Philip and Lysanias ruling over all the regions that made up Israel, we see that Israel is not only under pagan or roman rule, they are not even united, they have been divided into three different ruling regions.

We also know that during the time when Annas and Caiaphas were religious leaders in Israel, the faith of the people was not strong and vital. They were going through the motions, they were following the rules and the regulations, but there was no real passion or joy in what they were doing. I think some of the Jewish people’s own words recorded in Luke reflect this situation. In Luke 3:8 it says that the people were saying to John, Look we have Abraham as our ancestor so we are OK. Because of their history and heritage, because they were following the rules of their faith, the people didn’t feel like they had to make any changes, or go any deeper. They were content and comfortable which had led them to a place of complacency. Even if they wanted to get unstuck, they didn’t know what to do. When John called them to repent and baptized – to go deeper in their faith they say to John, what should we do. I think all these words show us just how much Israel was feeling stuck in life and faith. They weren’t experiencing real life or passion or joy, and they didn’t know what do to move forward. They were stuck.

Now here’s what is important for us to see here, when God’s people are stuck – he does something about it. In this situation God sent John with a message that would help the people move forward and experience the real passion and joy of life and faith. The message God sent was this: Repent and be baptized. (Luke 3:3) The way God gets people unstuck is through repentance and baptism. The way we get unstuck in life and in faith is to repent and be baptized and this works because repentance and baptism do three important things, they call us to stop, and to surrender and then start up again. Stop, surrender and start.

If we want to get unstuck in life and in faith then the first thing we have to do is stop. We need to stop and acknowledge that what we are doing and the direction we are going is simply not working. Sometimes getting unstuck means having to stop and acknowledge that we are lost, or that the choices we have made have brought us to this place that’s not the best for us and so need to make some new choices that will get us moving in new directions. Many years ago I was in Greensboro NC trying to find my way to the Greensboro hospital to visit a woman who was scheduled to have heart surgery the next day. I was one block from the hospital when I ended up on a one way road going in the opposite direction of how I wanted to be going. So I just hopped over one block thinking I would be on a one way road going in the right direction, but when I got there, I ended up on a one way road still headed in the wrong direction, away from the hospital and out of town. I quickly became lost but I kept driving because I was sure I could get myself back to where I needed to be. So I kept driving and I kept driving and I kept driving. Forget about asking for directions, I didn’t even stop to evaluate where I was or think about how to turn myself around.

Many times we may feel stuck in life and faith but we keep driving. We keep doing all those things that got us stuck in the first place instead of stopping and taking some time to think and pray about how we ended up here and where we want to go. Sometimes the best thing we can do when we want to move forward, or want to head off in a new direction is to first simply stop. Can we stop planning, stop plotting new courses, stop thinking about how we can move ourselves forward and just be still.

Eight of the most powerful words of scripture, and yet eight of the most difficult words for many of us to live out come from Psalm 46:10 where God tells us, Be still and know that I am God. The first step in getting unstuck in life and faith is to just stop and be still, and that’s the first step in repentance. Repentance doesn’t mean to just confess our sin or to feel guilt and shame for our failures and mistakes, repentance means to turn but before we can turn around we first have to be willing to stop. Repentance often calls us to be still and acknowledge that not only is God with us, but that maybe the direction of our lives or the desires of our heart are simply wrong and that we need to have them change.

So the first step in repentance and getting ourselves unstuck is to stop. Israel had to stop what they were doing long enough to see that all the ritual and rules they were following weren’t getting them anywhere and that their faith really had lost its heart and soul. They had to stop, but stopping isn’t all there is, we also have to be willing to surrender. That’s what baptism is all about – baptism is surrendering ourselves to God. It’s submitting ourselves to God completely so that God can begin to develop his heart and his life within us. That’s really what this ritual or water is all about. We often think of baptism as just a washing away of sin, but really – baptism is going into the waters of death so we can die to ourselves and rise up and live a new life with God. We lose that image with infant baptism, but that’s what’s going on here, that’s what baptism is all about. It’s surrendering ourselves fully to God so God can help us go in that new direction and find the deeper joy and passion of life.

While baptism is a sacrament in the church that most people only go through once, the truth is that surrendering ourselves to God is a moment by moment, day by day lifestyle. We need to go through these waters daily. We need to stop and be still and confess our sin and our needs to God daily. Whenever we are feeling stuck in life and faith, we need to stop at the water and surrendering ourselves to God so that we can take that next step, and start out again.

After the people of Israel stopped what they were doing and went out to John to repent and be baptized, they all had to come up out of the water to start living a new life. When the people came to John and were baptized they would ask him, what should we do. After we repent and are baptized, what should we do? What John told them was to go back and live a new life. Tax collectors go back and don’t cheat people any more – just collect the money that is owed - life a new life. He said to the crowds – when you go home, start living a life of love and generosity. If you have extra clothes, give them to those who don’t have any. If you have extra food, share it with those who are hungry. Start living a new life – move in a new direction.

When I was stuck in LA, I finally got to that place where I stopped and said, OK, this is not working. I admitted that the decisions that had led me to this place weren’t the best decisions I had ever made in life and I surrendered to God who then said, OK, Andy, now go live a new life. That new life for me meant humbling myself and asking my parents for money to return home to CT and starting over again. Sometimes starting in a new life is a humbling experience because we have to admit that the choices we have made and directions we had been going have been wrong – but if we are willing to move beyond that – we can experience all that passion and purpose and power God that has for us.

So what we see here is that God shows us how to get unstuck in life. We have to stop and be still, we have to surrender ourselves to God and then get up and start off in a new direction. This process is what it means to repent and be baptized, and it was this word that was given to the people of Israel to help them get unstuck. John was offering people something new and fresh and it worked. People were coming to John because these steps of faith worked and people were feeling free and empowered in their faith once again.

God honors these steps of faith and the reason I can say this with conviction is not because they have worked for me, because Jesus chose to do this himself. We almost miss it in Luke’s gospel because the baptism of Jesus is not written of in much detail, but Jesus stopped what he was doing, surrender himself to God through baptism and rose up out of the water he started living a new life. Now there is no evidence that Jesus ever felt stuck in his life or in his faith, but it’s interesting to think about whether or not Jesus may have had those feelings. If Jesus was truly fully human and experienced and felt all that we have experienced and felt in life, then did Jesus perhaps feel stuck in his life at this point in time? I don’t know, but I do know that by choosing to stop, surrender himself to God and the start out in a new direction as a public teach and preacher and Messiah, Jesus himself is saying that this is the right road for us to take whenever we are feeling stuck.

Jesus not only shows us that this is a good road for us to take, but God does as well. Look at God’s response when Jesus does stops, surrenders and starts out in a new direction, Luke 3:22. This affirmation by God not only affirms his love for Jesus, but by choosing this moment, God is also saying that repentance and baptism are good things for us. Stopping in life and faith to see where we are and where we are headed is a good thing. Surrendering ourselves to God is a good thing and trusting God to move us out in new directions with a renewed sense of purpose and power, is a good thing. I believe when we stop and surrender and start out again, I believe that when we repent and are baptized, God says to us, You are my son, you are my daughter, you are my child and with you and I am well pleased.